un: absterge

[downswing]

( 'lo, from the depths of the Mouse House, post-Unwinding: )

If... this were no dream. The child of the rains, bearing a vulpine mask. 'Hyang-Won' and his pale protector.

He is remembered? He did not appear as the other manifestations.

Though we have retrieves ourselves, we cannot abandon a child to nightmares.


( Guilt is strong among exorcists. )

Comments

[downswing]

Not... the first?

[binghua]

Mn. I am not proud of it.

[He breathes in, hoping to move past this.]

I cannot say for certain whether the child warrants such a reaction from us. What happened did not always feel real and parts of it were simply impossible from a physical sense. Maybe whatever made us hate the child was part of it all.

...I don't know.

[downswing]

I cannot speak if these feelings were my own or the world's.

[binghua]

Regardless of what it was, you still wish to help him. That means something.

[downswing]

Daozhang. May we?

[binghua]

If we are able, yes. It is the least I can do to help.

[downswing]

...daozhang, forgive hubris. Will the rains not afflict you?

[binghua]

I am only human. Same as you.

[downswing]

I cannot risk your life unduly.

[binghua]

Are you not risking your own?

[downswing]

The lesser loss.

[binghua]

[Xingchen exhales and mutters to himself: ]

That is quantifiably not true.

[Lan Wangji has at least Wei Wuxian amd Lan Sizhui who name him as family, if not more who have been claimed here. Maybe by Wei Wuxian more than Lan Wangji himself, but...

Xingchen claims Wei Wuxian by martial bonds, and Lan Wangji by proxy. Jiang Wanyin, too, if he stretches. No one he truly knows well. No one who actually depends on him for...anything.

But he does know that Lan Wangji is stubborn and that arguing this point further will get them nowhere. That's fine. He can be stubborn, too, in other areas.]

Then we find another umbrella. More than one, if we are lucky. Double them up and hold off the rains or other elements as long as we can.

[downswing]

( Quantifiably, the son of a clan compared with a hermit stray.

But qualifiably — )

Should the child demand off, hold rains at bay with another.

[binghua]

Exactly. We go in prepared.

[downswing]

If... he is chained to a curse?

[binghua]

...That would prove more difficult to rectify. Is this conjecture or do you have any evidence?

[downswing]

He appeared... dissimilar to us. Unconcerned.

[binghua]

But also not seeming to belong to that existence, as you said before.

[That...really isn't much to go on, nor is it really any evidence of a curse at play.

Xingchen falls quiet, trying to think of anything, trying to visualize any thread to catch.]

Could he have built up so much resentful energy around himself that it would cause even you and me to feel hatred toward him, despite us not being involved beyond meeting him? Or perhaps not even resentful energy as you and I know it, but something similar in this world. Something that has trapped him in that in-between.

[downswing]

...this aligns with ghostly patterns.

[binghua]

...Can we save a ghost?

[downswing]

Bring it restitution.

[binghua]

Of course. You practice musical cultivation, yes? With the qin, if I remember correctly.

[downswing]

A privilege of the clan.

[binghua]

A talent I do not possess.

[Stated matter-of-factly, not to put himself down.]

I think it would be beneficial to begin with your music and then rely on any sword cultivation should it get to such a point.

[downswing]

The guqin... does not invite. It compels.