Learning Diabolism

ꕥ"We're leaving" "Thank heavens"ꕥ

The next morning they were rudely woken up by the bells in Cloud recesses and this time, they weren't allowed to fall asleep again.
"Wake up, you need to eat something," told them Wei Wuxian as he mercilessly confiscated their blankets.
"Uhmmmmm... I want to sleeeeeep! It's not like we have anything better to do," grumbled Song Anyue and hugged her pillow.
"Didn't know you were so eager to stay here," smirked Wei Wuxian, than he added, "unless you want to be here for god knows how long, I suggest you get up. We're leaving in a few hours to investigate the sword spirit."
"Thank heavens!" jumped Song Anyue, suddenly full of energy.
"But how are we gonna do that? Where are we going?" wondered Wan Yunque, who slowly rose from her bed.
"Northwest," answered their teacher as they stepped out the door.
"Why?" asked Wan Yunque again.
"Well, you must have noticed yesterday when I told you to inspect the spirit," smirked Wei Wuxian.
"We noticed that is likes alcohol," shrugged Song Anyue. And Wei Wuxuian chuckled at that: "True, but did you not notice the way it moved?"
"Moved? More like it didn't move, the whole time it was in the same- oooooh," Song Anyue slapped herself across her forehead when she realized.
"It points northwest, doesn't it?" finished Wan Yunque, a bit grumpy, because they didn't figure it out yesterday.
"Well, now I'm certain you need a lot more work than I initially thought," told them an amused Wei Wuxian in reply.
"Ha! Wouldn't want THAT!" laughed Fox at the girls.
By the time they reached the dining hall, breakfast had started already. Nobody even flinched, when the demonic cultivators with a literal demon entered the room, but they were directed to some seats behind Hanguang-jun by the servants of the house.
"Eat as much as you can, you'll need the energy," told them Wei Wuxian as they seated themselves.
It took Song Anyue one look at the bland food before her to know, that she won't be finishing this. It took Wan Yunque trying to taste one thing to know that she won't be finishing this. In case of Fox, he didn't even bother to look at his food.
It was bland, tasteless, bitter at best. And to make matters worse - all vegetarian.
"Oh yeah, I'm not eating this, I'll just bother Jingyi to get me some nuts," mumbled Song Anyue as she payed with her food.
"Don't speak during eating," reprimanded her Lan Wangji.
"Am not eating," mumbled Song Anyue silent enough for him not to hear.

The end of breakfast was one of the greatest things that has happened during the past 48 hours, to the three troublemakers, though as they exited the hall, their bowls were still mostly full, but Lan disciples were leaving already and they hid in the crowd to escape.

"Wow, you actually got up today," said an amused, by now well-known, voice of Lan Jingyi from behind them.
"Because we're leaving soon," smirked Wan Yunque and Song Anyue cheered.
"Leaving? Where? Why?" asked Sizhui, who was visibly saddened by this fact.
"Aw, don't worry Sizhui, I'm sure A-Lu will write you letters from every city that we visit," laughed Song Anyue at his reaction.
The corners of his lips did lifed up a bit, after this statement, so Song Anyue considered her little mission a success.
"We are going northwest, to investigate the sword spirit with ma- senior Mo and Hanguang-jun," Wan Yunque decided to answer the original question.
"What! You're so lucky! Literally everyone wanted to go with them," said Lan Jingyi, clearly jealous.
"What can I say, we get all the lucky cards," laughed Wan Yunque.
"By the way..." smirked Song Anyue and made her way over to Jingyi, "do you have any nuts?"
As she said that, she poked his cheek and than quickly moved a few steps back.
"I'm not going to give you all the nut's I have!" argued Lan Jingyi and it seemed like he got a bit pink-er in the face, but that was probably just a play of lighting.
"Prrrrretty pleeeeeaase," Song Anyue made puppy dog eyes.
"Nope," stuck Jan Jingyi his tongue out at her.
"Awww, man, I'm gonna be hungry all day," grumbled Song Anyue.
"Serves you right, you should have at least tried to eat the food," smacked her Wan Yunque lightly and the taller girl's pout increased: "I tried, but that was NOT edible!"
"Well we ate it," smiled Lan Sizhui.
"Yes, but you are Lans and that doesn't count," added himself Fox,
"I get that you want to converse with your boyfriends, but we gotta go, I just saw the Mo-guy exit the hall."
"Boyfriends?" asked Lan Sizhui, surprised.
"Ignore that, he just likes to pair up everyone he sees," quickly cleared Wan Yunque up, "no matter the context, or possibilities. Anyway I guess we won't see each other for a while..."
"Hopefully forever," mumbled Song Anyue, which got her an elbow to the side, "ow..."
"...so I guess, this is goodbye," smiled Wan Yunque way too nicely for Wan Yunque smirk standards.
"Till the next time, take good care of yourselves," said Lan Sizhui his goodbye and bowed respectively, or at least he tried to, but he was stopped by Wan Yunque: "No need to be so formal, Sizhui."

So both Lans and all troublemakers just nodded at each other and turned to walk their respective ways.

They didn't walk too far, before Lan Jingyi shouted at them:
"Hey! Anyue! Make that "never meet again" a "may meet again"!"
And than he threw a bag of nuts at her. Song Anyue did not catch them, they landed on her chest, but she managed not to let them fall to the ground.
"I'll think about it!" she shouted back with a laugh and waved at the two Lans, than she turned around to her other friends.
"He totally likes you," smirked Fox.
"And we are totally late!" replied Song Anyue, as she stuffed her begged nuts into her bag and sprinted off with everyone else, because Hanguang-jun and Wei Wuxian were already waiting for them.

"Huh, just wanted to leave without you," smirked Wei Wuxian as they started walking.
"Ha ha ha, very funny," raised Wan Yunque an eyebrow at him.
Meanwhile Song Anyue was busy opening her nuts. The thing was, it seemed like a normal bag of nuts, but for the love of god, it was not easy to open. It couldn't be pierced through on the side, which was weird and it was stuck, probably with glue on the intended opening.

Well, there was a long way ahead and no time to lose... after all, the sword spirit was growing more restless by the day...

Author's note:
Okay, this one is shorter... but I didn't want to include the whole "stone castles" thing...? here... so have a very short chapter and thank you for reading!