[He's silent for a while before he lets out a long sigh and begins a new message, something that he hasn't told anyone since he'd arrived.]
I know that kind of power can't be trusted. I know it's dangerous. In my world there was a war. There was a man who rose to power who was cruel and corrupt who wanted to rule over everyone with greater authority than he already had. It was a defensive war, and one that we were losing. His son attacked my home. Me and my adopted brother and sister escaped, but everyone else was slaughtered. Every elder and disciple, every servant. My siblings' parents. The family who raised me. Every junior I'd ever trained.
My brother and I went back to try and help but. It was too late.
Anyway, that man was winning the war. He'd found a power that allowed him to win. He raised the dead on the battlefield. Even if we'd ever had a numbers advantage it wouldn't have mattered. Our own men rose again to fight us and his army couldn't be killed. We would have lost.
That kind of power was taboo, but we were going to lose. We were going to lose and everyone I had left would have been killed if we lost. My brother and my sister needed me. So I found a way to use it. I learned how to do what he was doing. I took away his advantage and we won the war.
[ there's a feeling of dread in mal's stomach, at the idea that not only can wei wuxian listen to the dead but also raise them. it makes him wary but, he's realized, it's not only a matter of power.
the man holding it matters too. ]
And what did you do with that terrible power after? [ because power like that corrupts, changes people.
mal's seen what having power and the belief that you're the only one that can do it does to people, is watching it happen. ]
There was a clan of people. A branch clan of the power hungry man who'd started that war. They didn't participate in the war, most of them weren't even cultivators. They were doctors and healers. Almost all of them elderly, women, and children.
But they shared that man's blood however diluted, and so they were thrown into a labor camp, experimented on, and slaughtered like cattle.
You asked me once why I left a comfortable life behind.
I saw that camp with my own eyes. I saw it and I used that power and I took those innocent people away. I defected so my rebellion wouldn't come back on my brother. I took them away and tried to protect them.
I've made a lot of mistakes in my life Mal. So many fucking mistakes. But that wasn't one of them. I'll never regret it. In the end I only bought us two years, but at least they got that. At least they got to live in peace for two more years.
But you want to know where I went wrong with the power, right? That's what matters now.
I was attacked and I lost control of it and an innocent man died. A good man. The son of someone important. The husband of someone precious to me. I fucked up. I lost control and it brought hell down on us. The details after that don't matter. I went to fight them for revenge and I lost control again. I don't know how, I—
It doesn't matter. Everyone was right, I was wrong, it was too powerful, I couldn't control it. So I destroyed it.
a lot that makes mal pity the people that wei wuxian was trying to protect, feel pity for him too.
at the same time, while most of the tale makes him feel a spark of wariness, where it ends snuffs out that flame and replaces it with respect. ]
It could be destroyed in the end and you chose to do it.
That's... that counts for something. There are plenty where I'm from that wouldn't if they could. [ mal thinks of the skiff, the sound of the volcra screeching as they flew past the limits of where the fold had previously stood. ]
Yeah. I guess. [And it's all he'll say to that. He doesn't disagree with Mal, and he'd like to think he's different from people like Wen Ruohan and Jin Guangshan, but at the end of the day, he's not sure how much intentions matter when there's so much blood on his hands.]
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🔒
[He's silent for a while before he lets out a long sigh and begins a new message, something that he hasn't told anyone since he'd arrived.]
I know that kind of power can't be trusted. I know it's dangerous. In my world there was a war. There was a man who rose to power who was cruel and corrupt who wanted to rule over everyone with greater authority than he already had. It was a defensive war, and one that we were losing. His son attacked my home. Me and my adopted brother and sister escaped, but everyone else was slaughtered. Every elder and disciple, every servant. My siblings' parents. The family who raised me. Every junior I'd ever trained.
My brother and I went back to try and help but. It was too late.
Anyway, that man was winning the war. He'd found a power that allowed him to win. He raised the dead on the battlefield. Even if we'd ever had a numbers advantage it wouldn't have mattered. Our own men rose again to fight us and his army couldn't be killed. We would have lost.
That kind of power was taboo, but we were going to lose. We were going to lose and everyone I had left would have been killed if we lost. My brother and my sister needed me. So I found a way to use it. I learned how to do what he was doing. I took away his advantage and we won the war.
🔒
the man holding it matters too. ]
And what did you do with that terrible power after? [ because power like that corrupts, changes people.
mal's seen what having power and the belief that you're the only one that can do it does to people, is watching it happen. ]
🔒 1/2
But they shared that man's blood however diluted, and so they were thrown into a labor camp, experimented on, and slaughtered like cattle.
You asked me once why I left a comfortable life behind.
I saw that camp with my own eyes. I saw it and I used that power and I took those innocent people away. I defected so my rebellion wouldn't come back on my brother. I took them away and tried to protect them.
I've made a lot of mistakes in my life Mal. So many fucking mistakes. But that wasn't one of them. I'll never regret it. In the end I only bought us two years, but at least they got that. At least they got to live in peace for two more years.
🔒
But you want to know where I went wrong with the power, right? That's what matters now.
I was attacked and I lost control of it and an innocent man died. A good man. The son of someone important. The husband of someone precious to me. I fucked up. I lost control and it brought hell down on us. The details after that don't matter. I went to fight them for revenge and I lost control again. I don't know how, I—
It doesn't matter. Everyone was right, I was wrong, it was too powerful, I couldn't control it. So I destroyed it.
🔒
a lot that makes mal pity the people that wei wuxian was trying to protect, feel pity for him too.
at the same time, while most of the tale makes him feel a spark of wariness, where it ends snuffs out that flame and replaces it with respect. ]
It could be destroyed in the end and you chose to do it.
That's... that counts for something. There are plenty where I'm from that wouldn't if they could. [ mal thinks of the skiff, the sound of the volcra screeching as they flew past the limits of where the fold had previously stood. ]
🔒
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Some people, plenty of powerful people, don't try. Don't give a fuck about bringing the innocent or the messes they made.
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