He's sure Wen Ying would love to go with her. 

And he thinks that that's a good idea?

He wouldn't suggest letting her be the one to carry the Yin Iron, but otherwise yes. 

What about the other Wens?

The vibe he gets from the Wen siblings is that you can trust or distrust them as a group but Wen Ying is the most proactive of them; if Lan Zhan wants to ask all three of them to come she's welcome to but Wen Qing might say no, whereas he's confident that if she approaches Wen Ying alone she'll say yes. 

Lan Zhan agrees with that assessment. 

Would Brother like for her to approach Wen Ying about this mission herself?

He can if she would rather.

(He has that much mercy, at least.)

Yes Please. Going on a quest with Wen Ying is terrifying enough without having to interact with her about it.

Meanwhile, Baxia has no immediate objections to the Wens.

In that case Nie Mingjue will simply loom ominously in their general vicinity for a little while and leave. 

"Huh. So that was Nie-gongxi's brother." 

"They are quite different, aren't they? But Chifeng-zun matches the stories."

"It seemed like he... really didn't like us." It felt angrier than the usual levels of dislike they receive from Non-Wens, but maybe that's just who Chifeng-zun is as a person and not because they'd done something specifically wrong.

"Yeah, uh, according to Nie-gongxi Wen Ruohan probably murdered their dad." 

Oh no...

"Do you think he would try to convince the Lans to execute us?"

"...Probably not? Nie-gongxi also said he cares a lot about justice." 

"Mhm. He didn't seem like he wanted to murder us either, I'm just... on edge. 

Even if we are permitted to depart Cloud Recesses smoothly, we will be returning to Qishan empty handed."

"I have been very assiduously preparing excuses. A couple of them involve murdering particularly loathsome retainers and hiding the bodies before we see Uncle. A different bunch involve me acquiring a handful of injuries for plausible deniability but I figured you would probably veto those." 

Yeah no shit. 

"D-do we, need our own excuses, Da-jie?"

"No. A-Ying will share the excuses she decides on and we'll all coordinate around them."

Hmmm. All three of them are together, which makes plan: ask Wen Ying by herself somewhat more difficult. And if he tries to get her alone to ask her without her siblings around on purpose, she might figure it out and get suspicious of why. 

Oh well. He approaches the three of them. "Wen-guniang. Wen-er-guniang. Wen-gongxi." 

She rises quickly. "Sect Leader Lan. You just missed Sect Leader Nie, if you are looking for him."

"Not in this particular instance. I was...wondering if it would be useful to your cover if you accompanied Lan Zhan as she seeks out the remaining Yin Iron shards."