Chapter Text
Nightless City burns with resentment. Lan Wangji grips onto Chenqing tightly as the corpses rise, crawling from the earth to their master’s beckon. He feels the rage boiling and the anger flooding through his veins, unable to be calmed by any of the Lan techniques he was raised on. He no longer knows what to do, lost and abandoned to the emptiness of loss. They are gone—Wen Qing, Wen Ning, all of them—perished under the hands of hypocrisy. Dead and burned. Gone.
His control weakens, his temper heavies, and he loosens his grip on the corpses, letting them rage forth against the very world who once admired the “great” Lan Wangji. He grits his teeth and ignores the pleading looks of his brother as cultivators from all sects draw their swords. He’s done all he could, and it’s all for nothing. They are gone. He is gone.
Let them come.
Then, cutting through the rapid whistling of the wind is a desperate, “Lan Zhan!”
Lan Wangji whips around at the sound of the familiar voice and sees Wei Wuxian running toward him in distress, bracing himself fast enough to catch him as he comes to a stop.
Wei Ying?
“Lan Zhan!” Wei Wuxian repeats, trying to catch his breath. Lan Wangji can feel his panic increasing as his arms automatically wrap around the other man. Wei Wuxian had not been there previously, to which he had been grateful for. He assumed Jiang Wanyin kept him away, knowing the stubborn man’s frustrating insistence on defending Lan Wangji. What is he doing here now?
“Wei Wuxian!” He vaguely hears Jiang Wanyin shout in the distance, finally taking notice of the one cultivator who should not be on this battlefield.
“Wei Ying, what are you doing here?” Lan Zhan demands, barely fighting against the call of thousands of souls, the only thing anchoring him being the scent of cinnamon and orange blossoms.
“I heard they were planning a siege on you,” Wei Wuxian tells him, warm in his arms. He directs wide eyes at Lan Wangji. “So, I broke through the wards Jiang Cheng had on my door and came here as fast as I could.”
“Wei Ying must leave now!” Lan Zhan urges, eyeing the battle raging on around them, intensity increasing with every second. The rational part of him knows Wei Wuxian is more than capable of protecting himself against the fierce corpses but the side aware of the resentment blurring his vision pulls at him to get Wei Wuxian to safety.
Wei Wuxian shakes his head fervently. “I can’t. Not without you.”
Lan Wangji clenches his jaw and resists the urge to shake Wei Wuxian at his achingly painful persistence.
In the background, a cultivator screams in pain.
“Lan Zhan, Er-Gege, stop this,” Wei Wuxian begs, looking up at Lan Wangji desperately. Locks of hair have fallen out from his ponytail, sticky with sweat protruding down his forehead and neck. “Stop the corpses. We can talk about this.”
“There is no longer talk,” Lan Wangji says with bitterness. “Only action.”
Momentarily, his grip unconsciously tightens around Wei Wuxian as he remembers the resigned determination on Wen Qing’s face as she led the Wen remnants to their death, only to loosen when he hears Wei Wuxian’s yelp.
Hell rages on around them.
Lan Wangji feels his grip being slowly pulled from him, burning like a viper’s venomous bite. It stings with a tinge of numbness (sharp needles), energy flooding through his body in a chaos of waves.
“Wei Ying, you need to go. Leave!” he demands again.
“Lan Zhan, please! Stop and come back to Yunmeng with me,” Wei Wuxian pleads, grabbing onto Lan Wangji’s forearms. “I can protect you. Come back to Yunmeng with me.”
Lan Wangji readies himself to deny Wei Wuxian once again when he notices the widening of Wei Wuxian’s beautiful, silver eyes and the sharp inhale he takes in. Then, he’s being pushed away by Wei Wuxian’s hands and all he becomes aware of is a barely-heard gasp of pain among a flash of silver blade.
All there is a staticky silence rushing through his ears.
He doesn’t see the desperation in Lan Xichen’s eyes as he fights against his own sect to protect Lan Wangji.
He doesn’t hear the grief-fueled cry Jiang Wanyin releases at sight of his brother’s wounded body.
He doesn’t notice the gasp from Jiang Yanli as she finally fights through the crowd and witnesses the scene before her, calling out for her “a-Xian!”
All he can feel is the dreadful wetness of deep scarlet on his hands as blood spills from Wei Wuxian’s chest. All he can think about is Wei Wuxian’s pale face and quickly weakening heartbeat as he falls limp in his arms.
His blood, oh, his blood.
“Wei Ying!” he gasps out as he clutches tighter around his body. “Wei Ying!”
Wei Wuxian manages a weak smile and reaches a hand to cup Lan Wangji’s cheek before it drops and his breathing slows to a stop.
No.
No.
Wei Wuxian is cold.
Lan Wangji shatters.
He pulls out the Stygian Tiger Seal and clasps it together. The corpses turn to him. He closes his eyes.
Agony floods through him—
And then nothing.