"I don't think my Wei Wuxian cares how either of you can be better for me."

His brain does a 180 like he's been shown an interesting math problem.

Oh. A bunch of things slot together in his head.

What makes doms insecure. Other him isn't here, other him is staying away, other him is holding borders. Other Jiang Cheng doesn't like what other him did or is doing but he's going with it and coming up with more plans. Other Jiang Cheng was upset about him calling him the wrong thing when he thought he was other him, and not just in a lashing him for disrespect way.

"Of course he cares, Sect Leader Jiang!" He maybe usually wouldn't say exactly that or exactly like that. But, subspace. ...Oh, is that why other Jiang Cheng hasn't been punishing him. That is exactly the kind of thing Jiang Cheng would not notice he was thinking, if he thought Wei Wuxian might get disobedient about punishment and didn't know what he would do. (Of course other Jiang Cheng can jump twelve feet and could overpower him easily even if he didn't have Zidian. But come to think did other Jiang Cheng ever get to asking him what power use he has? Maybe other Jiang Cheng thinks he can do all sorts of things.)

"I'm not going to make things difficult for you just because you can't call someone to come hold me down, Sandu Shengshou. - Other me won't either." (He doesn't especially have doubts about that as he says it. There's definitely all sorts of things he would do if he could and doms couldn't stop him, but 'trying to not let Jiang Cheng hit him when it would obviously make Jiang Cheng feel better' isn't one of them, why would he do that.) "He's not trying to just not be yours just because he has to hold borders against Jin Guangshan." And probably other people but that's the one he knows and one he and at least his Jiang Cheng can agree on some negative opinions of. 

Unfortunately belatedly it occurs to him there's a caveat to that. Which he doesn't want to say, he doesn't think that'll help at all. But it would definitely be worse if it comes up when other Jiang Cheng is actually around other him. Eyes-not-to-the-floor. "Ah, if you want him not able to get up for a few days, he might give you trouble. It's not you, Sandu Shengshou! It's the holding borders."

If he were home, he would get such a lecture now, and lines he would not have a great time sitting at his desk for. At the moment he feels like he has absolutely no idea how to tell if other Jiang Cheng is going to throw him across the room, or completely ignore what he's doing until Cleansing Day or whatever, or come up with another new way of telling him off. He hopes it's not that one. Or maybe really bury him in mud. But since he can't tell there's no point in worrying about it! At some point other Jiang Cheng will do something, or it'll become Cleansing Day, or other Jiang Cheng will want to deal with him before he takes him to see other him. Or he can ask other him when he gets there.

Anyway obviously the solution to the real problem here is to use combining two worlds' power systems to solve whatever is causing other him to have to hold borders, and then other Jiang Cheng can do as much as he wants to. And knock other him into subspace and crying on his floor until he feels reassured enough and - well, as secure as Jiang Cheng can get. (...He can predict that other him's Lan Zhan is not going to like this plan (his Lan Zhan is also not going to like this plan). But they have brothers and places they belong to too, they'll get it.)

No one could claim that he was inadequate compared to Wei Wuxian if they could see this.  Jiang Cheng would have expected to feel better about that, given the insinuations that have somehow only managed to increase after Wei Wuxian's departure, but it turns out there is a difference between wanting to be stronger and wanting others to be weaker.  When Wei Wuxian goes limp, he keeps hugging;  Whenever his Wei Wuxian tried to hug him and he didn't react Jiang Cheng did want to keep being hugged and was just too proud to admit it.  Presumably the same is true the opposite way around.


He listens to Wei Wuxian.  At first it's normal enough.  Jiang Cheng doesn't really believe that his Wei Wuxian cares.  Certainly not enough to not abandon and replace him, because that's what his Wei Wuxian did do and actions speak louder than words.  (He wonders if this Wei Wuxian will change his mind after they meet.  His Wei Wuxian will say something proving how bad Jiang Cheng is.  Then two worlds' Jiang Chengs will be abandoned.)

Then it gets into baffling.  Why would he want to hold other Wei Wuxian down?  That makes no sense if taken literally.  Hold him to his duties, like hitching an oxen to the plow, then? 

-No.  This is more of that bizarre insistence about punishment.

"Look.  Just.  Shut the fuck up, Wei Wuxian.  I have no idea what you're talking about.  You have no idea what you're talking about.  There is some kind of difference between our cultures or families that is making you think-"

Jiang Cheng tries to figure out why other him would bother whipping Wei Wuxian the way that Mother did. 

Though he doesn't pull away, his body tenses up and his free arm gestures in sharp agitated motion.  "Do people where you're from enjoy hurting their close friends and family?  It's not like I've never laughed when Wei Wuxian fell on his face when trying to show off, and it's fun to wrestle and hit each other and spar.  And I liked watching Wen Chao die, when Wei Wuxian decided to draw it out, but allies are different from enemies!  It would be one thing if it was serving a purpose, but if Wei Wuxian were going to change his behavior over being whipped it would have happened when Mother tried."

He can see a possibility clearly.  A version of Father who had asserted just a bit more authority, or perhaps a Mother who was allowed to be even more absent.  A Jiang Cheng who, therefore, had never seen how utterly useless trying to punish Wei Wuxian with physical beatings could be.  If so, he feels a little sick.  He always wanted Mother to stop.  Apparently that wouldn't have done any good, if that meant that Jiang Cheng had never learned how it didn't help and just did it himself.  It would be a logical experiment to try.  Jiang Cheng still kind of wants to punch that hypothetical other him about it. 

(Of course, back when he was being whipped regularly Wei Wuxian had never left the Jiang Sect to live in the Burial Mounds with a bunch of Wen-dogs.  He used to carry his sword and not do demonic cultivation.  Was this all Jiang Cheng's fault for not reining him in in the way everyone else considered best?)

He notices the food, which is starting to get cold again.  "Can we just eat now, Wei Wuxian?  I'm hungry, and I'm not going to go find you anything else to eat if our food isn't good enough for you."

Being hugged when he goes limp is nice. (If Wei Wuxian could hear Jiang Cheng's thoughts about inadequacy he would be baffled and kind of offended, but he cannot.)

Flinch. (Eyes not on the floor, eyes: not on the floor, eyes not on the floor). Right. Shut up. Of course he should do that, of course he should have done that - he couldn't even get responding to formal apologies right, he should have learned his lesson from that and not made other Jiang Cheng deal with him more and have to hug him, he's already worse than trouble to other House Jiang and here he is being more trouble to other Jiang Cheng, he already had to go and bother other Jiang Cheng by asking for more things, and now here he was opening his mouth some more instead of not doing that. (It can be kind of a problem sometimes when doms order him to shut his mouth and it's hard to tell if he's supposed to acknowledge or apologize or not do that, but. He got the point. He is going to: shut up.) 

Wei Wuxian doesn't pull away either. If Jiang Cheng is paying the right kind of attention when he gestures, he might notice that Wei Wuxian - kind of flinches again, just a little, muscle reflex, and kind of something like braces a little, and - doesn't flinch away at all. (Is other Jiang Cheng going to finally hit him? It's going to hurt. He wants other Jiang Cheng to finally hit him. He deserves for other Jiang Cheng to hit him.

Flinch. (Or maybe it's still the same one and just more of it). Wei Wuxian knows that's not a question. It's like when the doms ask 'do you think that was appropriate behavior'. Nope, being confused about that is not the problem he has. Obviously no one is going to like having a submissive they have to deal with over and over again (and again). It's not like there are positives! (Beating him personally might sometimes make Jiang Cheng feel better but it's not because he wants to have to do it) (-And if Wei Wuxian was behaving himself and Jiang Cheng wanted to hit him to feel better anyway, he could just do that; he's not the married kind of submissive but he's still of the household.)

It's not fair how he has to be a secret so other Jiang Cheng can't just get one of the - ?disciples - to whip him. He knows that's still using the resources of - the Jiang Sect - even if other Jiang Cheng mostly didn't have to bother personally.

He's kind of glad his Jiang Cheng doesn't laugh when he falls on his face.

Wei Wuxian is absolutely aware that there are exceptions to 'do not hit a dom, we are very and officially serious about this, let alone your dom'. He has personally had self defense training. He's been to Cloud Recesses. Obviously army and police and bodyguard submissives hit doms all the time or that wouldn't work very well. And if you've got both subs and doms training they might hit each other and if one of them is yours it'd be dumb to just train with everyone you don't live with (not that doms never do dumb things). Doms and subs both carry swords here and fight monsters, he knows that already. And even more obviously you can hit your dom if they tell you to - some doms like that sort of thing!

It is still really hard to fit into his head other Jiang Cheng just casually mentioning that other Jiang Cheng and other him hit each other - and other Jiang Cheng is calling it fun! (- He has never gotten the impression that his Jiang Cheng is the kind of dom who likes that-sort-of-thing).

...They let submissives torture doms to death here? (Yes, he also knows submissives can have that line of work, at least where he's from, but he doesn't think other Jiang Cheng is saying other him had that line of work). 

They let submissives decide to torture doms to death here?!? - Is that supposed to be more humiliation for the dom? 

And, with a war on other Wen Chao managed to get himself into something that gets doms tortured to death. And get caught. And not even something High Master Wen could get him out of. There's a point for this world. Good decision making, other him. 

...oh, oh fuck, did other Wen Chao try to rape other him. - He cannot think about that now, he is going to put it away somewhere and think about it not now.

...And with that sequence of sentences in his head he has completely failed to keep track of what other Jiang Cheng was actually saying to him. Aside from how much trouble it is to have to keep punishing him all the time. He got that one.

He looks down. Not at the floor. On the bright side since he was told to shut up other Jiang Cheng is probably not going to ask him what he just said.

He thinks he's supposed to acknowledge, now. "This one apologizes, Sect Leader Jiang. I'm very grateful for your provision, Sandu Shengshou, and for the food of the Jiang sect." Subdued again, quiet. He doesn't pull away, or think of it, but he'll follow immediately if or when other Jiang Cheng lets him go.

Jiang Cheng has been trying his best to be gentle, and Wei Wuxian is still flinching?  He's frustrated, and can't even snap about it because it will make Wei Wuxian flinch more.  He hasn't- well, okay, he pulled him off of a roof before he knew that other Wei Wuxian wasn't his Wei Wuxian.  And tied him up with Zidian for questioning.  Jiang Cheng thinks it over and still decides that those were warranted. 

He picks up on how shocked Wei Wuxian is by whatever he'd said.  Probably the part about how local Wei Wuxian tortured a man to death.  Is there a Wen Chao in the other world?  Would other Wei Wuxian have heard of him?  It does sound bad without context.  Jiang Cheng will let the local Wei Wuxian explain, because he doesn't want to talk about Wen Chao when they're about to eat.

Right.  Formality.  Because secreting away the doppelganger of the notorious Yiling Patriarch is the sort of thing that requires the same etiquette as banquets.  "It is of no concern.  The Jiang Sect is honored to offer hospitality to our guest." 

He walks back to the table and proceeds to turn his attention to it's contents.  With the same grace he had been trained for handling formal dinners in the main hall of Lotus Pier, he begins serving the food.  Each one is described - cooking style, expected flavors - all in the solemn tones that Lan Qiren would approve of.

It is not the kind of foods they serve at cultivation conferences.  There is the ever-present rice, along with skewers of meat, lotus root cooked two different ways, dumplings, a local flatbread wrapped around vegetables, half of a baked sweet potato, and a skewer each of tanghulu set aside for last.