It's Wen Zhuliu.
He nearly slips on the treacherous steps, steadying himself with a hand on the rough rock wall jutting out adjacent to him, when he sees the two children next to what used to be the Chief Cultivator's body.
"What happened?" He demands, barely able to make himself heard over the rocks still blasting to the ground just a few yards away from them.
"We were playing hide and seek," Xue Yang says, shamelessly letting the lie roll off his tongue and making it sound believable. Years of street smarts make this encounter so much easier.
"We heard a noise," Wei Ying says, letting his bottom lip tremble as if he was distressed. He is, but that's by the by; this is another sticky situation they need to get out of.
Xue Yang throws him a quick thumbs up when Wen Zhuliu turns to look at Wen Ruohan properly. "He must have slipped..."
He's clearly in shock. Anyone would be, because Wen Ruohan is not a pretty sight now.
"On the plus side, I guess you're free now," Xue Yang says, a cunning look dawning in his eyes.
"Maybe you should leave," Wei Ying tells him earnestly. "You could change your name and stay away from the Cultivation world. Maybe find somewhere quiet to live. You wouldn't have to worry about anything, then."
Wen Zhuliu doesn't say anything, sinking down onto the step just above the landing.
"Well, I dunno about you two, but I could use a drink," Xue Yang mutters, pulling out a jar of wine from his qiankun pouch. He unstoppers it with his teeth, but before he can drink from it, Wen Zhuliu snatches it out of his hands and tosses his head back, chugging it all down.
Wei Ying's eyes widen as he sees the mark on the bottom of the jar, and when he looks over to Xue Yang for confirmation that this is one of his spiked jars of wine, from when he had attempted to poison the Jiangs, he gets a cheeky wink instead.
Not even thirty seconds later, Wen Zhuliu slumps on the steps where he's sitting with the wine jar still dangling from his fingertips.
"Well, we should go," Xue Yang says casually, as if they haven't had an active part in killing two of the main bad guys off Lan Zhan's kill list. Like, the top two, most dangerous badasses of all time.
He holds a hand out for Wei Ying to help him up, and they begin the long climb upwards again.
"I really thought he was listening," Wei Ying murmurs. He glances back momentarily, before continuing up the steps.
"Nah, I dunno. How long do you think before some fucker went looking for him? Or he himself decided that he wanted to come back and cause havoc? He's better dead than a question mark. Even from his point of view. He'd end up on the run for the rest of his cursed life, or being blackmailed into doing really bad shit. Honestly, we did him a favour."
Wei Ying throws an incredulous look at him.
They reach the yawning daylight of the open door of Wen Ruohan's bedroom, and then another shadow blocks out the light.
"What the fuck?" Xue Yang exclaims under his breath. "Wasn't this place supposed to be secret?"
"It's me," Lan Zhan calls out.
His voice makes Wei Ying run, straight into his open arms and they hug quietly, both relieved that the other is safe.
Xue Yang lets them have a good five minutes as he potters around the room, picking up items that seem interesting and maybe not putting them back.
"Alright, guys, maybe we should get out of here." He reminds them as they reluctantly part. They're kind of cute, how much they love each other.
Wei Ying quickly explains what happened to them, as they come down the stairs from the upper floors down to the now deserted kitchen. Then, it's Lan Zhan's turn to tell them all about Wen Chao making his father fall and both of them getting covered in Wen Xu's ashes.
