Way too untamed, way too wild

Time to think

Lan Wangji was sitting completely still during Wen Qing's narration. It was horrible, more than he could have imagined. Both the way the Wen siblings came to the Burial Mounds and how they have been surviving here. And how Wei Ying had been living until now.

Although even Wen Qing apparently did not know much about his life before she came to the Burial Mounds, it had been largely enough for him to get the picture. He had to get the children and Wei Ying away from here as soon as possible. No one deserved such a life, especially not a group of innocent children.

Wen Qing apparently understood that he was indisposed at the moment, too shocked to say anything about her story. She uncurled herself and he could see tears glistering in her eyes, he was sorry he made her remember her horrible past. She stood up and dusted her clothes before bowing to him politely, as she probably learned during her years serving under Wen Ruohan.

He only managed to return her politeness with a slight nod of his head before she all but whispered, her voice hoarse as if she was about to cry: "Thank you for listening to me, Hanguang-Jun. I hope this was helpful to you. You can come find me in the other cave if you have any questions. I am going to look after Wei Ying and A-Yuan." Then she left without turning back.

Lan Wangji was still sitting in the same position as before, his mind too preoccupied with thinking about what he had just learned to worry about anything else.

It was now clear to him why the Wen work camps had been decimated, it must have been because of the desperate rebellion Wen Qing's family orchestrated to let the children escape. If the living conditions there were as horrible as he feared, and he was sure he did not know the whole truth yet, then he would have to inform the rest of the cultivation sects as soon as possible. If there were still some Wens left in those camps, they had to help them; there were even children as young as A-Yuan and he was certain that there were also elderlies among the civilians after the war.

That was however just part of the things he would have to take care of. The second part was to help the children living in the Burial Mounds. From what he had understood, Wei Ying had probably been living here for years now and he was the one to make this place habitable. Lan Wangji could not even start to imagine how the Burial Mounds must have looked when the boy had come here the first time. Had they been the same as close to the barrier? Surely, no one would have been able to survive in that raging whirls of resentful energy and ice cold wind.

How did Wei Ying manage to live, much less make a life for himself here? Wen Qing did not know after spending almost half a year here and taking care of the boy's health. He doubted Wei Ying would tell him if he just asked like that, but it was still worth a try, he would not be able to learn the truth otherwise.

He had to know in order to be able to prove to the cultivation world that the boy was harmless and was only controlling the resentful energy to survive. It would probably be hard; he cannot let them believe that Wei Ying was another emerging Wen Ruohan or they would kill him for sure. They would not think twice that he was just a child with an unfortunate and traumatizing past, the war was still too fresh in their memories and they were afraid of the sole mention of demonic cultivation; the fact that Xue Yang had escaped and no one saw him after the final battle was not helping at all.

Perhaps he should try explaining to Wei Ying why he needed to know all about his past and the way he is controlling the resentful energy. The boy seemed bright enough to be able to understand that he wanted to help him despite living away from the world since being a small child. He had to, there was no other way for him to help the inhabitants of the Burial Mounds to get away from this hostile place which was slowly killing them despite Wei Ying's best efforts.

The boy was apparently caring very much about those he had taken in; he would want to help them without a doubt. Lan Wangji was still marvelling at the fact that Wei Ying had been hardly surviving here on his own but was still sort of takin in all the unfortunate children he had encountered, or at least it seemed that way to him.

Had he not been caring about his own life? Wen Qing had said that he was taking upon himself everything and that it had been hard on him. He wondered just how bad it was; Wen Qing was a doctor so she knew that something was wrong, but had she been overestimating the damage to have him help them or had she been hiding thigs from him because she thought they needed some trump up their sleeves for later? He had no way of knowing at it was causing him no small amount of worries.

He had to take everyone away from here, the sooner the better, and let them be examined by a Gusu Lan sect doctor. They had enough supplies to be able to whip the children back to perfect health, fortunately those looked only malnourished, he had no seen them being affected by the resentful energy, although they should check to make sure.

Wei Ying however, that was something completely else. They would have to assess thoroughly in which ways the resentful energy had been affecting him. The regeneration process would probably take a long time. There could even be after effects, no one knew much about demonic cultivation and no one knew for sure how to treat those affected and influenced by it.

This whole thing was becoming much, much more than he had thought when he had volunteered to go check the situation during the Discussion conference in the Lotus Pier. It was more complex and surprising then anyone in the cultivation world could ever imagine.

At least he had learned one soothing thing, he had not been the one to injure Wei Ying. It had been the Yunmeng Jiang sect's seniors that Jiang Wanyin had sent to investigate before him. The thought, however liberating it was, did nothing to ease the weight on his mind. This all was just too terrible for words.

It still took Lan Wangji a while to gather himself enough to stand up and come outside of the cave. It was already almost getting dark outside and the children who had been playing tag before were now slowly stopping. Most of them were sitting down on the ground, visibly tired. But it was the kind of tiredness one would get every day in the evening, Lan Wangji could tell that it was a bone deep exhaustion. He had seen a similar look on the faces of disciples who fell down on the ground after a battle, unable to move.

It was extremely concerning to see it happen to small children, it must have been because of malnutrition. The energy from the food Lan Wangji had brought had been burned and now they had nothing to keep them going. The older ones were making sure the younger ones were all right and were helping them stand up. Then they all headed towards the cave Lan Wangji was still standing in. He watched with concern how the children all fell onto the ground, huddling close one to another and using the too few blankets which had been available.

The visibly oldest child was left without anything to cover himself, making sure that the toddler who was laying by his side was fully covered. Lan Wangji's heart was bleeding when he took down his outer robe and wrapped it around the child's tiny shoulders. The boy smiled at him and thanked him. Lan Wangji nodded, hiding the sorrow he was feeling. He regretted he could not do more.

How could anything like this be happening? The cultivation sects took pride in proclaiming they were making the world a better place and protecting the weak, but right here, there was a stark naked proof of their failure. Right before Lan Wangji's own eyes. The world had abandoned these children. The only one they had was Wei Ying, a child just like them, still not even of age, who was the only one doing the right thing.