ic inbox, ryslig.

[daozhangs]

WELCOME TO YOUR PRIVATE CHANNEL, XIAO.XINGCHEN. FOR SECURE COMMUNICATION, USE 018.07.154.55 *** XIAO.XINGCHEN has joined 018.07.154.55 <XIAO.XINGCHEN> You have reached Xiao Xingchen. <XIAO.XINGCHEN> I am often away from my laptop, but I will do my best to answer as soon as I'm able.

Comments

[daozhangs]

( though this afternoon finds xingchen at lotus pier (a deliberate choice made in his careful effort to both support runyu and ensure that he has space to work through that which he feels in privacy), it's a relatively peaceful visit in which both he and jiang wanyin busy themselves on their own tasks in companionable quiet - and so his reply to runyu is fairly quick in coming. )

Regarding the doubles, you mean? I have.

[fishfairy]

More how they came to be. How much blame for this chaos do you believe should be the Fourth's?

[daozhangs]

( a pause, thoughtful. xingchen knows what he thinks and feels on the matter, but how to articulate it? )

I feel that the notion of 'blame' may be less helpful in this matter than you might think.

( yes, he knows that's a bit cryptic. another reply comes shortly after: )

All of that which I've heard and witnessed of Elias speaks of one whose goals align largely with our own, but who also seems largely unable to recognize the forthcoming consequences of that which he does. He is young, perhaps immortally so. No amount of godlike power will change that.

Perhaps he is partially responsible for what happened as of late, but I myself find quite a bit more fault in the man who took the endorsement of an adolescent as immutable proof that his foolhardy idea was the proper course of action.

[fishfairy]

[ Runyu releases a small sigh after reading Xingchen's reply, expelling some tension he didn't know he had been holding onto after seeing that network post and listening to the tape within. It's difficult to speak on some matters close to his heart -- that much is apparent after November's awkwardness -- but it's still a relief that he hasn't become unable to speak to Xingchen at all due to that. ]

Your views on this matter mirror a portion of my own feelings in this matter. However, as much as I wish to put most of the blame, or perhaps, fault of this event on one individual follower of the Fourth, there is a part of me that grows more wary of the Fourth's perceptions in this. He is a child, but he is also immortal. He should have had time to learn.

He seems to ask for friends but doesn't try to stop them from causing harm or starting on a dangerous path. He seems naive but cold. It doesn't seem right. How much can you trust someone like that?

[daozhangs]

( 'awkwardness' is hardly how xingchen would personally choose to describe that which occurred at the end of fall - but then again, he prefers not to describe it at all. no two people agree at all times and on all matters, and since they were unable to find an acceptable middle ground, xingchen has decided it best to put the matter from his mind altogether and move past it, in their friendship and within his own heart. )

Should he have? I suppose that depends on whether his aging truly did halt with his ascension, or whether it merely seemed to. While I certainly don't pretend to understand this peninsula's 'modern medicine', no amount of time can account for the fact that his mind was never given the chance to develop beyond the incapacity of youth.

[fishfairy]

Can one truly stay a child all these years as an immortal? Can one truly remain that naive?

[ And would Runyu deem that a sin as he once did his brother's naivety or would he see this turn of events as something else? ]

His whole existence confuses me in more ways than I believe I can express. Even more so than the Fog after my discussion with her follower Noa.

[daozhangs]

( it's quite fortunate that runyu has not yet thought to declare naivety a sin in xingchen's presence. not because it would upset him, certainly not. it's just that runyu would be confirming that which xingchen has attempted to show him from the start: that he, too, is far from blameless for the harm he has caused. when they spoke of it, runyu argued that he had been tricked - but what was it that allowed him to be tricked? his naivety.

as for the actual topic at hand, though: )

I'm quite sure that one can, yes. Whether such a thing applies to Elias, I've yet to discern.

[fishfairy]

From what I've understood from my talk with Noa, it was not his choice to be confined to this form. It was not his choice to take this path, but who knows how many years, decades, or centuries have passed since then. He's another god, but does he in any way act like a leader, even a hypocritical one? Or is he just a child, a figurehead for another cause?

I'm sorry, friend. I keep bombarding you with foolish questions. Both the Fog and Elias have elements of their story that ring too close to my own, reminding me of my failures.

As long as I'm like this, I'm sure Jiang Wanyin will scold me for my indecisiveness yet again.

[daozhangs]

My understanding of his origin is much the same.

As for whether or not he acts the part of a leader, I suppose that depends on how one pictures a leader to act. I've met some number of them throughout my life, and no two have acted alike.

My friend, please be assured that your questions are neither foolish nor unwelcome. I admittedly can't help but wonder what you see of yourself in the Fog, but I don't wish to pry.

Reminder that this is before the Hanahaki so before he can no longer hold back with XC )

[fishfairy]

[ For a while, it seems like Runyu won't respond to that message, but at last, although the words come slowly, Runyu makes an effort to put a small portion of the truth out there, wrapped around what he's learned about the Fog. It's more subterfuge. He knows of this, but he cannot help it. He may have returned from the mountain, but he has not resolved that which drove him away in the first place. ]

You once told me what you'd been told about the Fog - that she seemed to be kept at bay by the other gods and took her revenge. However, Noa painted her as a mediator who lost herself when the war destroyed her sisters, the Day and Night gods. In that story, she tried to good and yet fell to her rage.

That is my story.

At least the Fog attempted to mediate between the opposing sides. I chose neither side and tried to destroy both because neither seemed to care for my words or actions.

[ This version of events ignored the factors before that Xingchen already knew of, the death of his mother, the Empress' treatment of himself, and the glorifying of his brother and ostracization of himself. But to Runyu, the sins he had committed were greater than his hurts, not because of the destruction of the heavenly realm, but the deaths and suffering of the two people once closest to him, Jinmi and Xufeng. ]