onesided xiancheng - jiang cheng has only ever seen her shixiong as a shixiong, told that boys will start to notice her, to give her flowers and gifts and fight for her attention, but wei wuxian has always been there, dragging her away to play, calling "jiang cheng! jiang cheng!"

"look at this! look at what i'm doing!" and since their childhood he's given her all sorts of things, a scrawled drawing, a pretty rock he found, a frog - and she yelled at him for bringing the slimy creature in and making a mess as he teased "are you scared?"

but as yu ziyuan's daughter, she's obviously made of sterner stuff, and she grabbed the amphibian and marched out of the inner rooms to hurl it into the lakes outside. as they grew, she watched wei wuxian start to flirt with other girls and felt jealous at losing a companion.

she was his shimei, so what was he doing running after pretty girls and slacking off on his duties! and he smiled widely when she scolded him and he said "i love you, too, a-cheng!" and she hmphed - "what nonsense are you talking about?" and thought he was just joking in his

usual carefree manner when he started giving her flowers, and gifts, "isn't this pretty, a-cheng?" and it indeed was very pretty, but it wasn't something to give to a shimei, and she just said "what, are you practicing for other girls?" and didn't see the way his face fell

her long hair tied up in braids and a practical bun, her sleeves tight to her arm inside of long and coquettishly fluttering, but the roundness of her cheeks melted into a sharp, attractive face, eyes pale and large and fierce, wei wuxian sneaking glances at her slender neck

and the way the purple fabric she wears strains against the curves on her developing breasts when she moves, as much as she dresses as a boy, or when he playfully pushes her into the lakes for a swim and she clambers out, soaking wet fabric clinging to her waist and figure

"i love you, meimei!" he calls out, and she smiles, but not in the way he wants, "yeah, whatever,"

and he runs off to sate his curiosity about the world, but if it's also to have her chase him down, yelling in exasperation and worry, it's his secret to keep.

she is the daughter of a sect leader, the heir to a sect, and he is just a servant's son.

when she's running after him, shouting at him to stop and stop being an idiot, he can pretend that she's running after him because she wants him back.

he likes her envy and jealousy in the cloud recesses when he runs after lan wangji, wanting to see what will crack the perfect composure of the (pretty, so pretty) second jade of lan, and he feels his heart soar when she shouts "why don't you marry him if you like him so much?!"

and he grabs her arm, "aww, don't be like that, i'd rather marry you, meimei!" and she stares at him in odd confusion and flattery and a slight blush, but shoves his hands away "don't be stupid!"

because she is a sect heir, and he is a servant's son, and he watches her gaze flit

over to the flawless, ever-kind first jade of lan, older and taller and more distinguished than wei wuxian will ever be, looking at zewu-jun the same way he always wanted her to look at him, freely giving him her unbroken attention when he had to tug and joke and cajole for hers

"first in the list of young masters" nie huaisang whispers, wei wuxian hating the pretty pink of her cheeks and the way her eyes never broke away from lan xichen during that one lesson he stepped in as a guest lecturer instead of lan qiren, her hand shooting up to answer

his questions to the class and then flushing, eyes sparkling, when he praised her for her phrasing and promptness

so of course wei wuxian creates a scene and, with sneering politeness, proposes something shameless and outrageous and scowls when lan xichen and his flawless

manners only smiles in bemusement and takes his answer seriously, explaining why his proposal wouldn't work as jiang cheng and lan wangji and their classmates tired at his guts glare at him, and she bares her teeth at him in a threat of violence, silently communicating "behave!"

it's not fair, wei wuxian thinks darkly in moments of weakness, if jiang cheng wants him to stay with her always, then why doesn't she want him the way he wants her?

she's clearly interested in someone else - lingering at the end of lan xichen's lesson and asking him if he could tutor her on something she doesn't understand with a shy, artless coquetry, and before lan xichen can answer, wei wuxian interrupts rudely-

"oh, that? if you have any problems, i'll help you, meimei! i can tutor you! let's go, i'm hungry-" trying to drag her away, and her eyes widen as she apologizes for her shixiong's lack of manners and tries to shove him off

she yells at him after that - that was the first jade of lan, the heir to gusu lan, how could he have been so rude? and he enjoys the way she puffs up in anger when he calls lan xichen another boring fuddy-duddy - right until lan wangji passes by and glares hatefully at him for

having the audacity to talk about his older brother that way, and wei wuxian, his soul but a bird soaring through the capricious winds, is immediately drawn to him, chasing after lan wangji and shouting apologies, telling him he was talking about someone else

and he feels a vicious, spiteful sort of joy at jiang cheng's expression of being left behind. good. let her feel the same thing he's felt, and maybe she'll understand. "wei wuxian, where are you going?!" she shouts, crestfallen, and he waves his hand carelessly "i'll catch up

with you later!"

lan wangji almost fights him again like that night he was caught sneaking alcohol in, and wei wuxian feels inordinately proud for leaving a crack in the icy jade of the second young master lan. having meimei chase after him in return is unreasonably satisfying.

wei wuxian does not often consider the long-term consequences of his actions, and this is one of them. his dormitory is empty - jiang cheng in her own room at the girls' dorms, since cross-gender visits are forbidden, and the next day she looks way too pleased as she lovingly

smooths over a set of notes in beautifully elegant handwriting - even lovelier than hers, although wei wuxian swears he's never seen anyone with better calligraphy than his shimei, and when he asks her where those notes are from, her cheeks tinge pink when she recalls how she

went back to the classrooms after he left, and fortunately managed to bump into lan xichen again - so she took the chance to clarify her doubts and he even went to the lengths of giving a set of notes for further studies. they're on the driest thing possible, yet she holds them

as if they're a love poem from the first jade of lan himself, and ugly jealousy rears its head within wei wuxian as he resorts to his usual bluster - "i told you i'd help you with the material! what even did he write?!" plucking the notes from her hands as she cries in outrage,

crumpling them from her tight grip, and the explanation is extremely succinct and easy to read, which irritates him even more "wow, he's really abstruse, isn't he? not everyone can be a genius like him. this is useless!" tossing the notes aside like garbage, and she squawks,

and immediately lunges forward to collect each page and gently smooth the creases out of her precious notes. "shut up! he explained it to me perfectly! if you don't even understand something so simple, then i guess you're just an idiot!" she says nastily.

"besides, you were running off to bother lan wangji anyway. why should i wait for you when i can just go ask lan xichen?" she taunts, and he knows it's a spur-of-the-moment remark, but it doesn't stop his heart squeezing painfully.

'why should i wait for you?'

when he's swallowed down the bitterness and put on his usual happy smile, he resolves to do his duty as Jiang Head Disciple by protecting his future sect leader and shimei from lecherous old men - lan xichen, obviously.

and oh, she's shocked and downcast when he runs off, but

now that he's sticking to her like an annoying mosquito, she won't stop complaining. he can see that sheet of paper she hides within her textbooks - a neatly written list of questions about the material, meant to impress someone. what a waste of her calligraphic talent.

she doesn't even try to use the excuse of looking for a tutor around him, because he's right here, and he will monopolize her time should she ever mention it, so she keeps her mouth shut and fumes. they may be miserable together, but at least they're together.

regretfully, wei wuxian's attention soon wanders elsewhere - back to a particularly interesting second jade of lan, and jiang cheng slips through his fingers like a slip of ribbon floating in the wind, yet again finding her beloved lan xichen, her laoshi, coming back all giggly

like the flustered maiden she almost never is.

-

seasons change, years pass, the cloud recesses hosts another crop of the cultivation world's promising children, and the first jade of lan gains his boldest admirer. proper and determined, overcoming her shyness with the bravery

to speak to him, even if it's merely about the lessons to start with, jiang wanyin is said to be quick to frown, but reserves her bright smiles for him, and lan xichen is admired from afar, praised, deferred to, but like how the tallest mountains are spoken of with awe and

reverence, yet few make the climb, and the sect heir of lan has precious few friends. flowers bloom, leaves scatter, and lan xichen and jiang wanyin fall into a youthful, innocent romance.

wei wuxian watches and his heart is full of envy.

+

for jiang cheng, for her, for love, he gave up his core. for righteousness, to protect the innocent, he gives himself, taking the remnants to yiling and guarding them with his corpse puppets. he cuts himself off from yunmeng jiang so it does not bear the stain of demonic

cultivation, and thinks that perhaps he can be content away from his family, sacrificing himself for the love of others.

jiang cheng storms up to him and demands he return, that the sect needs him, and he wonders, where is her beau? where is the venerable zewu-jun?

there were whisperings of a marriage alliance back when they, still young and innocent, returned to lotus pier, because the heirs of lan and jiang had taken a fancy to each other.

"that's not important! you promised, wei wuxian, you promised we'd be the twin prides of yunmeng!"

but yunmeng jiang cannot have a demonic cultivator as a head disciple, can they? and in his characteristic feigned nonchalance he tells her she doesn't need him, zewu-jun will help her, and it infuriates her, even as he can see the beginnings of angry tears in her eyes.

"lan xichen is of gusu lan, and you are the jiang head disciple!" she speaks of things he has long abandoned, all her words hiding silent pleas for him to come home, to come back to her, and it's really starting to annoy him. why is he always ordered around like a pet

bound to the whims of its masters? why can't he have what he wants?

resentful souls whispering in his head, he takes in his shimei in her elegant, beautiful purple robes and smirks.

"What are you willing to give me for my return?"

she thinks she has nothing to give him, crying out "Wei Wuxian!" in outrage and anger, she is the heir of a destroyed sect, no money, no property, only ruined land.

"What do you want?" desperate and vulnerable enough in front of her shixiong, her childhood.

"You'd do."

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AHAHAHAHA