Blind to You

Worms and Dragons

A/N: thank you for the votes/comments! I hope you like the chapter. :)

Lan Xichen didn't get angry very often. He found that there were often two sides to every story, and each person deserves a chance to explain themselves before reprimands were enforced. After the point of explanation, Xichen was rarely still angry. Maybe frustrated, perhaps disappointed, but it was hard to be mad when you understood someone.

He supposed it was also in his nature to be calm and observant; Lan Xichen was one who avoided confrontation if he could, opting for finding a solution or letting it go, rather than submitting to his passionate emotions.

This is not to say he was never angry. He had been angry at his father, and his uncle, and Meng Yao, if only briefly, and more recently, slightly upset with Wei Wuxian. Xichen was frequently angry at himself.

But now, he could be described as furious. Wangji was next to him, holding a stack of Gusu Lan scrolls, stoically observing the situation. When he glanced at his older brother, a touch of surprise flashed across his features because Lan Xichen looked angry. His brow was furrowed and his mouth turned down in a displeased frown.

Others who did not know Zewu-Jun intimately would guess he was frustrated or maybe just concentrating very acutely, but Wangji knew that this expression meant furious . As this didn't happen often, he was shocked, and so Wei Wuxian was surprised that Lan Zhan was shocked.

"Who did this?" He demanded, another surprise since Xichen didn't demand things; he politely asked or suggested. But walking into Jiang Cheng's room and seeing him coughing blood and hearing him talk about fighting someone... it genuinely angered him.

Wanyin seemed surprised as well.

Lan Xichen continued in an uncharacteristically harsh tone, "Was it that evil cultivator?"

His voice commanded the room and it was almost completely silent, save Jiang Cheng's ragged breaths. Finally Luó Bolin spoke.

"Yes. He... slipped past our guards tonight."

Lan Xichen quite literally seethed. "As if he hasn't done enough," he spat (SPAT!), hurrying over to Jiang Cheng and sitting down next to him.

Even the air was quiet. No one knew how to react, or how to respond, or overall what to say, so Wanyin went with, "Did you get the books?"

Xichen softened, inhaling through his nose and releasing the tension from his stiff shoulders. In his normal voice, he responded, "Yes, sorry. I just hope they can be of use to us."

It was not until three days later that everything changed.

xxx

" Did you know that every single living thing on this planet has spiritual energy? We're all born with it... The difference is how much. Some are as insignificant as you, worms wiggling through the dirt of the world, oblivious to their miniscule part to play. Some are fairly important; these are the birds, picking and choosing which worm to eat for lunch. And some... Some are dragons, devouring both the bird and the worm as an afternoon snack. These are cultivators like the Lans, the Jiangs, the Wens, the Jins, and, above them all, the Yiling Patriarch, awe-inspiring shows of power and spiritual energy."

The young girl was lost on all these metaphors, as she didn't really care about worms or birds or dragons or any sort of animal, she just cared about escaping this cave. So, while the man rambled on in a raspy tenor, she scanned the surroundings and formulated a plan.

The cave was mostly dirt and crumbling shale, with a wide opening that the man was blocking with his body. The girl wasn't scared of him, but she was scared of death. Luckily she had a few tricks up her tattered brown sleeves.