[At Lotus Pier]
Lan Sizhui's body lay silent in the middle of Lotus Pier's ancestral hall. Lan Jingyi, Jin Ling together with Ning Yingying and Liu Qingge stood guard. They didn't know why the enemy wanted him but one thing is for sure, it's not for anything good.
Qingheng-jun and Jiang Fengmian stood before Wen Rouhan. As expected of Meng Yao, his brains calculated everything right. They were even amazed with the precision and cunning plan he had. After all, Qishan fire's can only be used by a living Wen. It was a confidential information limited to the Sect Leaders and few elders. As of now, if Wen Rouhan obtain Lan Sizhui, he can will Qishan to his bidding. Especially, Lan Sizhui is a direct Wen descendant.
Outside the Lotus hall, Qingheng-jun and Jiang Fengmian even asked Wen Rouhan for a cup of tea. To the cultivator's, it was some kind of a joke they couldn't even comprehend. Why would an enemy enjoy a cup of tea? Nevertheless, they watched Wen Rouhan sitting nonchalantly before Qingheng-jun and Jiang Fengmian.
"It would be great if that Nie LingRen and Cangse Sanren is here." Wen Rouhan comments and sips from the teacup.
"The group might have been completed if Jin Guangshan is also here." Jiang Fengmian.
"So? Going for diplomatic conversation? Is this really the time you're going with that? Do you even understand the situation?" Wen Rouhan mocked. However, both Qingheng-jun and Jiang Fengmian wore the same smug smile.
"There is nothing like that." Qingheng-jun answered, "We're just here to chat with you before our official business."
"Oh? Sounds new? Of course, official business comes later." Wen Rouhan smirked and cracked his neck, "what might that be?"
"Why did you raise that war?"
Along the cracking fire, the cup on Wen Rouhan's hand shattered. His amber eyes stared at Qingheng-jun's gold and Jiang Fengmian's dull purple.
"Because I am bored." Was his answer.
"Just some nasty hobby you got as ever, Rouhan." Qingheng-jun smiled his face dark and unreadable, "...scum..."
"Shall we go with our official business then?"
In a blink if an eye, three swords finally clashed shattering the threshold, grins and smiles plastered on their faces.
[Hua Cheng's POV]
He dug his own eye when drove to madness. Hua Cheng knew that feeling of wanting to give up or just die miserably or anything painful. He knew the feeling of desperation and insanity but he wasn't one to give up easily. He endured eight hundred years waiting. So, he can't continue to watch this person throwing his life as if it didn't matter. Wei Wuxian doesn't have any reason to lose his life for this fight, if ever, he needed to think how to survive and got by.
Taking his core, will be the last thing Hua Cheng had in mind. "Wei Wuxian." If he does, then everything would be meaningless for them in this fight. "Come here." Everything they stake would be nothing worth.
That selfish request. That naivety. Everything they would fight for will be nothing.
"To save everyone is a gallant and brave thing to do." The words that held him in warmth. Those words spoken softly with tender resolution, "that includes your life."
Xie Lian always told him those words. The words his god failed and caused misery. Yet, as the person who holds his god dearly, he knew that feeling, that failure, that desperate attempt to fulfill that vision. Wei Wuxian is doing the same at the same time not. "Do not fight humanity with humanity."
His words strucked the gold. Wei Wuxian's eyes widen and stared at him blankly, "there's no happiness in a fight with life thrown away."
He understands. Hua Cheng understands that selfless love for the world. "Do not throw that life for people who had taken you for granted. At the end, you'll just end up in misery."
The same instance. The same hopelessness. Hua Cheng thought he sees Xie Lian in this brat, but it wasn't the case. He sees himself in Wei Wuxian. His naive former self that cost him that lonely eight hundred years. The desire to cling to life when everyone is giving up. The same fate of losing everything and building it together. Hua Cheng have known despair, that insufferable poison that drives a person so madness. That yearning, those silent broken tears fading into the dark.
The path he willingly took when everything had left him with nothing.
To not to hate the world. To not to abandon it again. Hua Cheng never cared for it but he cannot. He can't when his beloved loves that god forsaken world that lead them to this.
And yet, he's telling this person to protect it and himself.
He's telling him as a person desperate in need.
Wei Wuxian had everything he previously wanted. Wei Wuxian had that family, friends and people he lacks. Yet, for those smiles, for those laughters, Hua Cheng can't turn away. The sadness behind mischief silently remained. The pain on those smiles. The moment's melancholy.
Ah... His Highness was right.
「"Relationships should depend on chance and whether if we're on the same wavelength, not on social status. If I like you, you can be a beggar and I'll still like you. If I dislike you, you can be the emperor and I'll still dislike you. Shouldn't it be like that? It's simple logic. So, whether if you're human is irrelevant."
San Lang laughed out loud, "Yes. You're very right."
"Right?" Xie Lian said, laughing along too. But the more he laughed the more he felt something was off, and it came to him suddenly.」
Meeting them might have it's purpose other than saving the world.
Every time they would see the tears of those love ones. Every time they hear those cries of despair, that cold anger keeps building inside them and continued to swell.
Deep down the depth of their being, there's a revulsion they can't fight.
They wanted a normal life. They all do.
But the world won't allow it.
"Are you telling me this because of me? Or are you speaking to yourself?" Wei Wuxian's question rang. Hua Cheng never tore his gaze away.
Losing all reason out of self preservation, to murder only with instincts laid totally bare. When it's true they've been in constant state of anger ever since they were condemned by the world.
They were told not to cry. Told that they're not even human being. T
were told the that pain will be over if they give up.
They were told that they don't need to know they have to die.
They were were told their is more pain to live. They tell you it's going to happen to you. They don't know how many times they have to look into the darkness alone.
They don't know how many time people have come and go, nor one to stay by their side.
"Both."
Wei Wuxian smile dropped. "You are the first person...." There were tears, tears held back from the very beginning, "....who ever told me that..."
They were never a good person. He, Wei Wuxian and Luo Binghe bears their own contradictions and burdens. Their hands were stained with blood by both their love ones and enemies. They were someone unforgivable and condemnable, and yet... They wished for it... Wished for someone to understand that fact that even their lover cannot.
They never wanted to take this path nor take this path of blood.
They stood on a bridge with nothing but silence and fear. They were driven by demons called man. They had to cut down their heart, kill their emotion, making them believe that those demons were correct. They had always been there, waiting, waiting until the time was right. Knocking down lives after lives.
They didn't want it. Never, the will. But, it is their love ones that drove them into this pit.
And yet... They're still holding onto that world to continue to protect those smile.
That want and need. That love and hope led them to endure the long suffering silence.
"... Do not give up that future along with your life..."
That one thing, never again they had to give up.
No one knows how much fear they had when they woke up in grief. No one knows how many times they stumbled and forced to stand up.
No one knows they needed someone and ended up driving their own selves for those broken promises. No one knows how many time they acted fine when they were not.
No one knows they trusted their lives to these people every moment of their life but ended up betrayed and left behind in the last.
No one knows the tears they shed were the most noble, significant, purest and warmest thing they can do.
That constant pain—always lurking alone. That dreadful darkness comes as it slowly takes their soul.
They had to act along, played their part while this crushing darkness breaks their heart.
"Love yourself as much as you love the world."
For this words to come out on their own, they knew and understand each other's pain.
No one knows when was the last time they cried before anyone, making sure it didn't hurt themselves.
No one understood their desire to be pat in their last moments of their lives and tell them, "it's okay."
"Same to you, Cheng-Xiong."
They all had everything on their second chances but it was too late to heal their broken hearts and souls.
Deep down, they are still hesitating and wanting but they're afraid, their second chances will disappear.
"San Lang." Hua Cheng replied, "I will allow you and Binghe call me that."
"Haha! Then Wei Ying or A-Xian would be fine to! I should tell Uncle He! But Grandpa Cheng is phenomenal. Well that's for later discussion. For now... It seems that our opponent is clicking his tongue."
"Glad you finally remember me." TianLang-jun smirked sword at hand, "you will regret ignoring me."
"The best is save for the last. But Emperor's Smile comes First."
"Yow... Finally escaped Grandpa Cheng's ex-girlfriend. He was kind of persistent."
"Not yet." Qi Rong appeared, "we meet again, Crimson Rain Sought Flower."
"Ah! He really is persistent! Cut me some slack!" Luo Binghe whined.
Hua Cheng huffed but even before negotiations goes, TianLang-jun hummed, "Go back... I can take them all by myself."
Hands held out, TianLang-jun challenge, "come on... I can take you three."
[At Lotus Pier]
The shattering crystal left Sizhui's body unscathed. He stood before Wen Rouhan who wore a devilish expression.
"Now... Time to fight... Kill them, my little Wen."
"SHIZUI!"
...to be continued...