It started with a whisper.
Wake up
His consciousness returned in slow increments, with first a whisper. Then, a glimmer of light in his eyes brought back his vision. He took a deep breath of the crisp, clean air, lungs expanding full for the first time. He tried to swallow but his mouth was dry and so was his throat.
It was then that he realised that he could hear the sounds of water lapping against something, like a long forgotten dream. If he focused properly, he thought he could hear the sounds of three children laughing as they played in the water.
When he was aware enough to untangle his limbs and straighten from his fetal position, he felt stiff and gangly, unused to his limbs like a newly born colt. He straightened himself and slowly pushed himself to stand while looking down at himself. He was wearing black robes, thick but silk-like, flowing on his skin like water. His hands looked like his own but there were no scars and aches that he was so used to.
He felt new, like he had been reborn.
"You have. Been reborn, so to speak."
He looked over to the source of the voice and saw a beautiful young man in white with a weimao atop his head, drifting gently to stand beside him. Around his neck and wrists were equally white bindings that flowed with the non-existent wind.
"Who are you?" he asked hoarsely. Then, a pause. "Who am I?"
The man in white smiled kindly. "You are Wei Ying, courtesy name Wei Wuxian."
"I don't..." Wei Ying frowned, trying to remember but there were only flashes of images in his aching head.
"Don't worry. You'll remember soon enough," the other being said. "Your death was painful and traumatic so it'll take time for your mind to make sense of things and compartmentalize."
"Death?" Wei Ying parroted, flashes of green and pain flashing across his mind.
"Don't force it," the young man said, reaching out slowly. Wei Ying flinched instinctively but the gentle touch on his head only served to ease the pounding pain in his head.
"How...? Are you a healer?" Wei Ying asked, touching his head, which felt exponentially better, as if he had been given a miracle hangover cure.
"Ah no. I'm just a simple god," the young man said pleasantly. "My name is Xie Lian."
Wei Ying paused, wide-eyed. This was when he realised that he was in a place completely dark with only stars to light their surroundings. He was standing on a wooden pier, reminiscent of those in...
In Lotus Pier. Where he grew up with his siblings. Except narrower.
But there were no other buildings except miles of water and the wooden pier.
Just a single plank road.
"Where am I?" Wei Ying asked in apprehension. "Am I in hell?"
"Oh no. You are in your realm," the young... god? said, looking around. "I admit there's some renovation that needs to be done but that's entirely up to you."
"What..? What does that mean? My realm?" Wei Ying asked, now in complete confusion.
"This is the realm of the dark," answered Xie Lian easily. "Now it is your domain."
"What-? Why?" Wei Ying questioned in bewilderment.
"Because you are now the god of this realm," explained Xie Lian gently.
"A god?" Wei Ying repeated in complete disbelief. "A god? Why a god? I've killed a lot of people. Tortured them. I've desecrated so many graves. I've... I don't understand... I caused so many deaths."
"You killed the Xuanwu," Xie Lian calmly answered. "You should have ascended then."
"Lan Zhan killed the Xuanwu," Wei Ying answered automatically.
"You both did," the older being answered easily in return. "You developed dark cultivation. "
"Demonic Cultivation," Wei Ying interrupted again.
"Dark Cultivation," Xie Lian corrected serenely. "Demonic cultivation is used by demons, not humans."
Wei Ying paused. Huh, that argument was sound. Why hadn't he thought of that before?
"You may have killed a lot of people," Xie Lian continued without a hitch. "But you have also saved a lot more."
"I didn't save anyone," Wei Ying denied. "Everyone died!"
"You saved your brother," Xie Lian answered quickly.
"I didn't!" Wei Ying protested. "I'm the reason Lotus Pier was attacked. If that didn't happen, Jiang Cheng wouldn't-"
"You gave him your golden core and saved him, didn't you?" Xie Lian interjected, making Wei Ying shut mouth with a snap. "Because he was precious to you."
"And Lotus Pier would have burned anyway," the Flower-Crowned Martial God continued, "because Wen Rouhan would never have stopped until he burned everything to the ground."
"Your actions saved the sects and the common people. So never think that what you did is inconsequential." Xie Lian finished.
Wei Ying still looked unconvinced but Xie Lian patted him on the shoulder.
"In time, you will understand what I mean," the former Crown Prince of Xianle said. "As immortals, we have all the time to learn from our mistakes, make amends for it and come to terms with everything."
Wei Ying stared at the ground for a long while, before he spoke again. "You said I'm a god. What kind of god am I? God of the Dark? God of Death?"
"Close. But not quite. You are now Fuxing Zushi *," said the heavenly being. "The Venerable Patriarch of Renewal."
"The God of Destruction and Rebirth."
***
It started with a whisper.
The boy, merely three years old, had wandered away from his inattentive father when a pretty butterfly on a string caught his attention.
He followed after the bobbing little jade pendant, not paying attention to where he was going until he lost sight of the pretty butterfly as its owner turned into a building with red lanterns at the front.
The little boy then turned around, looking for his parent who was no where to be seen by now. Distressed, the boy toddled off after someone who looked like his father but was not. The man, unaware of his little shadow, walked out of the village centre while whistling merrily to himself.
The boy followed after as best as he could but soon fell behind just as they left village, leaving the poor boy in the middle of the wilderness. As dark fell and the moon begin to show it's pale face, the little boy's cries began to taper.
"Die-die..." the little boy whimpered, tears streaming down his round cheeks as he fell on bum. He'd been walking for so long that his feet hurts and he was so scared because it was so dark. And there were scary sounds around him and glowing eyes in the bushes.
Over here
"Die-die..." the boy called out plaintively.
Over here
"Die-die!" the boy tried again, confused when his father didn't show up.
Over here
The little boy looked up just as a glowing ball of light materialised into a young man, who peered down at him in concern.
"Did you get lost, little one?" the young man asked, smiling at him prettily.
"Uhn," the toddler nodded, sniffling miserably. "Gege, hungry."
"Oh, you poor thing," crooned the young man, kneeling down beside him with no care for his beautiful black silk robes. From his sleeve, he pulled out a warm bun and gave it to the little boy, reminding the starving child to eat slowly when he tried to stuff it all into his mouth. Then, he gently pulled the boy into his arms and stood up.
"Let's get you home, shall we?" he said, brushing the tears on the boy's cheeks with his sleeve. The gege's hand was cool to the touch but the material of his robes were soft, unlike the rough linen of his parent's clothes.
The little boy nodded and when he finished the bun, he snuggled into the man's shoulder, falling easily into sleep as the man floated off into the sky.
When he woke up, they were on the street where his house was located. The gege put him down on his feet and pointed straight to his house.
"Your mama is waiting for you, baobao," the gege said, smiling down at him gently. The moon was shining brightly behind his head, like a halo and the radiance of it made the boy gape, his little mouth shaped like an 'O'.
"Remember to always stay with your die-die next time," the beautiful young man reminded, a gentle hand sweeping on his head. "Now, you should go. Your mama is right there."
The little boy turned towards his house and sure enough, there was his mother coming out of the house with a worried look on her face, wringing her fingers as she looked out into the darkness.
"Mama!"
She stared in shock and put her hands on her mouth when she registered the sight of her missing son.
"Baobao!"
His mother ran out of the gate and threw her arms around her toddler, bursting into tears at the relief of finally having her son in her arms.
"Baobao! Mama was so scared! Where did you go!?" she blubbered as her son patted her back.
Just hours ago, he had been crying non-stop for his parents but after the young man arrived, he felt safe and comfortable enough that he no longer felt scared.
"How did you get home?" his mama asked.
"Yue-gege took me home," the little boy answered. "We fly and baobao woke up home."
The woman wrinkled her forehead as she tried to decipher her son's words. Yue-gege? Brother Moon?
She looked towards the direction her baby came from and only saw the twinkling of starlight beneath a glowing circular moon.
***
Perhaps because the Burial Mounds was where he self-destructed that Wei Wuxian visited the place first when he returned to the mortal world for the first time since he ascended.
It had taken him months? years? decades? (who knows, time in his realm flows so differently) before he got accustomed to his responsibilities, and that was with the guidance of Ling Wen, Dianxia and Yama. If he didn't have their help, he wouldn't even know where to begin.
Nevertheless, it was only after he'd managed to clear all his backlog that he could finally make time to visit the mortal world. Surprisingly, it hadn't been that long since his death. Maybe only 2 years have passed, so he probably hadn't missed much.
The Burial Mounds still looked the same, at least, if not more desolate without Wei Ying there to cleanse it with Chenqing.
Wei Ying sighed, thinking of his black flute. He still missed it. Even if he could easily forge another one from the black bamboo of the Burial Mounds, it still wouldn't be the same. Chenqing had followed him through the thick and thin of his life that it just wouldn't be right to replace it. Just like it was never a replacement for Suibian.
I wonder who has them, he thought idly to himself as he floated gently over the Burial Mounds. Perhaps he will go retrieve both Chenqing and Suibian after he was done with this.
His feet landed on the ground and immediately, little shoots of green started blooming around him. It was one of the things that had perplexed him in the beginning, but he soon realised that it only happened when he touched something that was ruined, like a burnt out forest caused by wildfire, and of course, the desecrated grounds of the Burial Mounds. It would be a different story if he stood in the middle of a lush forest. He was not the God of Spring or New Life, after all.
He took steps towards the homes that the Wen remnants had built, leaving behind a growing collection of foliage. Wistfully, he gently touched the broken wood and planks left behind by the seige, reminiscing the good times that they had. However short the time he had with them, every second of it was very precious to him. When he had visited every home and touched every one of them, he headed towards the Demon Slaughtering Cave.
His workshop was bare of things and whatever that was left behind was strewn carelessly and left to rot. He surmised that the sects must have ransacked his workshop hoping to retrieve the schematics for the Stygian Tiger Seal. Well, if they wanted to destroy themselves, they were welcomed to it.
He walked further into cave, where the blood pool lay, where he knew that there were some souls there that were precious to him.
It was time for them to move on.
It didn't take long at all.
He lifted his hand over the blood pool and willed them all out. Slowly, one by one, the remnants of the Wen clan materialised into ghostly forms in front of him. Upfront was a slumped elderly lady that tilted her head to smile at him softly.
Wei Ying sniffled as tears came to his eyes.
"Popo," he said gently. "It's time to go. I'm here to take all of you to the afterlife."
Wen-popo's face looked worried as she looked around the gathered aunts and uncles.
"It's okay, Wen Qing is waiting for all of you," he answered. "Wen Ning, I will retrieve him soon. Though it will be unlikely that he will choose to join all of you. At least, not yet."
He put his hand on her shoulder, though he shouldn't be able to touch her semi-corporeal form, his connection to the afterlife allowed him that leeway.
"First, all of you have to be put to rest. Then, the rest of Burial Mounds," Wei Wuxian said. "You all deserve it."
Wen-popo looked down at her empty hands, as if lamenting the loss of something.
"Don't worry, popo. A-Yuan is safe," Wei Ying told her. Then, he touched her forehead and she became a little ball of light. "I'll make sure of it."
The rest of the Wens followed after, becoming fireflies that floated into the air and into the bright moonlight.
"Now then," Wei Wuxian said, turning towards the borders of the Burial Mounds where the fierce corpses that he once used to protect the Wens were still roaming.
"Time to finish things off."