audio | un: yiling patriarch

[weifinder]

Hey, every one of us glorious abductees! A question, to those listening right now, brought to you by myself and Master Archeval due to the considerations of a friend, but: what would you make of being informed that, and here I'm quoting, "The man you trust was six years not among us?"

( A dramatic pause, for digestion purposes. )

All said and done, with that message slipped to me, I can say with certainty there's a handful I fully trust here, and there's none I trust entirely from here, no offense. However, there is one we've been forced to trust, ah? In hearing these words, what are your thoughts?

Comments

[weifinder]

( This is... different. Different is not good or bad, different is something to be wary of, and even this response: what the hell does it mean? )

I'd say yes, it would help, but the Wens attacked and Meng Yao released Xue Yang from the dungeon before his execution could be carried out. Shi... Shishu, I... don't understand. Lanling Jin had nothing to do with Xue Yang until Meng Yao was acting as Jin Guangyao.

( Everything horrible that followed is a list he can partly name from borrowed experience through Nie Mingjue's dead eyes, but that's not the point. The point is: )

I know what they say about my memory, but it's supposedly what I forget, not remembering two completely different truths. You wouldn't lie, and that's not what I recall. Just... even the timing? You didn't descend the mountain before I threw myself off the cliff in Nightless City?

( Yet another difference, if he knew. )

[binghua]

[This is all very confusing and awful, is what it is.]

Xue Yang was a disciple of the Jin Sect, so it should have been their responsibility to punish him for the Chang Clan massacre. If that happened for you.

[Anything seems to be possible at this point. But at least when the topic seems to steer away from Xue Yang, Xingchen's hands slowly begin to relax their grip. He's still incredibly uncertain, but he can get himself under control again.]

I wouldn't lie about any of this. I have no reason to suspect you would, either, but I swear I did not leave until after you died. Except...Nightless City? They say you died in the siege of the Burial Mounds.

[The popular theory - or at least the one Xingchen has heard the most - is that Jiang Wanyin was the one to kill Wei Wuxian, but true or not, it doesn't seem right to accuse a man's adoptive brother of such an act.]

[weifinder]

( It would not, at least, be a surprise if he said so, though Wei Wuxian would defend Jiang Cheng for all that it had been a complicated situation where Jiang Cheng's actions helped to reinforce Wei Wuxian's decision at the time. Still, even more so, he's frowning. Unseen as it is, some can be heard in his voice. )

He never was of the Jin sect, only the Wens. His relationship with the Jins was all in the shadows?

( These differences are too significant. He doesn't know what to do with that, not fully. Slowly, as if sounding out each word... )

Is... it at all possible. We're both right? That the things we do or don't recall... aren't because of this place, or something odd messing with our memories. That there are two different places where we both lived?

( ...................... this hurts his head and fascinates him at the same time, because he cannot think of this man as a liar, and he doesn't trust his memory in all things, but he does in these conflicts of details. )

[binghua]

[It seems futile to argue these details now and, really, what point does it serve? Jin or Wen, Xue Yang is still reprehensible and Wei Wuxian seems to agree, or at least Xingchen would hope he does. Nightless City or the Burial Mounds, Wei Wuxian still died at some point. Everything being mismatched still doesn't really sit well with Xingchen, but the main events seem to crossover between the two of them.

Suddenly a little tired from all this, he leans back against the plant table, his shoulders dropping.]

Maybe. If we didn't agree on one or two little details, I'd put that down to hazy memory or bad information, but we have such drastically different experiences that can't be misremembered. And considering the others in our group who wouldn't call our home as such, it's clear we all come from different places. Perhaps even times, as impossible as that sounds. Maybe we're missing the forest for the trees.

[weifinder]

( Oh, no, he knew the different times. Xiao Xingchen alive, Wen Qing breathing, these are not possible from his world, from his time.

That's a different sort of disturbing. Xingchen isn't reacting to Xue Yang in the soulbroken way; the name caused him pain, but he hadn't shattered, and Wei Wuxian doesn't know if mentioning Song Lan or Xue Yang at the time of Xiao Xingchen's death would have produced a response so comparatively... reasonable.

Wen Qing is even longer out of the world he knew best. So... )

For the sake of the forest, we... may have to admit, the layout of truth as we thought we knew it is more flexible than it was before. Maybe we... how we're pulled here, we don't understand either. The gates, that whole process, it's an unknown. If we're from the same worlds or not, from different times as... well, we are, Jiang Cheng doesn't know what he should and that's only explicable if he hasn't lived through the learning yet. So we're from different times, certainly, and different worlds, even if we thought we shared the same one.

( He pauses. )

I don't know about you, but I can really use a roasted potato after that thought.

( Also because he has no more wine right now. )

[binghua]

[All of this is still impossible, even if it seems to be the most likely explanation for everything. Time simply doesn't work like this, let alone people from multiple worlds converging on this same spot. It physically and literally cannot happen, and yet...

Maybe Xingchen is more tired than he has been for a long time because it's almost easier to simply accept the impossibility than try to stand up for logic again and again. Maybe he's slowly growing weaker the longer he doesn't cultivate as intensely as he once did.

In the end, he simply nods, accepting Wei Wuxian's findings, as well as the change of conversation. For real, this time, since Xingchen dragged them back to this in the first place.]

It would be a welcome improvement.

[weifinder]

( AND SO HE SERVED HIS SHISHU A ROASTED POTATO AND IT WAS GOOD BECAUSE HE COULDN'T ACTUALLY MESS IT UP, IT WAS ROASTED, A TOUCH OF SALT, POTATO TIME! )