MDZS - In Cinemas Now! Starring WWX and LWJ

Chapter 1 - Prologue

The moon glowed bright and round over the trees. A full moon, perhaps an auspicious sign that the juniors' secret night hunt with Senior Wei would remain unnoticed by Master Lan. Even if they got caught, Sizhui pondered, it would have been worth it. Today's night hunt had been especially exciting - they'd encountered a huge huodou (fire-breathing black dog from Chinese mythology). Senior Wei had nearly fainted from terror, but Sizhui and his group eventually defeated it without him, much to their delight. It took about 2 sticks of incense worth of time for them to coax Senior Wei from his hiding place in a tree hollow (Jin Ling's snickering hadn't helped).

In short, their spirits were high as they stealthily dropped one by one over the wall of the Cloud Recesses, Senior Wei in the front. Jin Ling came with them, wanting to see them off.

"Wei Ying." Lan Wangji's voice, though calm, sent terror rippling through each of their spines. Each of them ducked back behind the corner of a building. However, Wei Wuxian hurried forwards, a beaming smile on his face as he looped his arm through Lan Zhan's.
"Lan Zhan! Were you waiting for me? Wei Ying is sorry for making you wait, come, let's go back to the jingshi and I'll tell you about where I went..." He dragged Lan Zhan away, clearly giving the juniors an escape route.

Just as they were about to scamper away, thanking the heavens for Senior Wei's great ability to distract Lan Wangji, another, much more aggressive, voice came from behind them.

'Jin Ling! Where do you think you're going! Don't you try to hide!" Evidently, Jiang Cheng was also waiting with Lan Wangji for Jin Ling to eventually turn up.

"Uncle! I- I was -"

"Don't you call me 'Uncle' like that! How many times have I told you-"

At this precise moment, however, midnight struck, and a peculiar sensation swept through them all. A split second later, they found themselves in a completely different place to where they were before.

'- you aren't allowed to...go out.....without..." Jiang Cheng's sentence trailed off as looked around in confusion.

Jin Ling was confused by this sudden turn of events, albeit relieved towards whatever was happening that was sparing him from another of his uncle's lectures.

They were currently in a very large, very odd room, illuminated by strange, tiny little lights. The room was full of strange, red contraptions that were actually very comfortable - like a bed, but bent in half and with platforms on the side so that one could sit on it and rest their arms on them. In each of these red contraptions, there was a person sitting. Jin Ling appreciatively rubbed his hand the fabric of the red contraption - it was unlike any fabric he knew - rougher than silk, but soft nonetheless?

"What happened? How did we just go from the Cloud Recesses to here?"
Jin Ling looked to his right and sure enough, Lan Jingyi was sitting in the contraption beside him. On his other side was Lan Sizhui, and Ouyang Zizhen was one further down. His uncle, Jiang Cheng was in the row in front of them, who currently still seemed lost for words, thankfully.

~

Wei Wuxian flicked his nose. Whoever had done this must have been extremely powerful, he thought. Transporting such a large number (half the cultivation world had to be in this huge room at this point!) of people in one go, so quickly, with such neatness, was more than unheard of - it should have simply been impossible. Then again, clearly, it was not impossible, and he, Wei Wuxian, had never been one to be held back by feeble words like 'impossible'.

He tried to stand up, but found he couldn't move his lower body. Alarmed, he looked around for Lan Zhan. Thankfully, he was just beside him, in another red contraption.