"...that's going to be hilarious."

"It is rude to speak ill of the Chief Cultivator."

"Fucking Lan."

"I feel like I'm missing some context," says Nelen mildly.

"The Chief Cultivator is an idiot who is only the chief cultivator because all the other options are in seclusion, thirteen, or my brother."

"He relies heavily on his advisors."

"He says 'I don't know, I don't know, I just don't know' and breaks into tears while decisions happen around him. That's why we're in Qinghe, he can't make up his mind about whether to kick us out."

"Well, that doesn't sound like the hardest personality for Vanda Nossëo to work with," says Nelen mildly.

"He's great. There will be no mass murders while he's in charge, he wouldn't be able to make up his mind about whether to do them."

(Lan Sizhui is quietly preparing a second butterfly.)

Nie Huaisang is having a very bad day. 

Apparently new immortals came from the stars? And it didn't occur to Wei-xiong* to tell him this until five minutes before the delegation started?

(No fewer than twenty-two different people believe they are the secret power behind the throne whom Nie Huaisang is completely dependent on, except of course when he's too incompetent to execute their perfectly clear instructions; still, any replacement would probably be less easily led. Wei Wuxian knows perfectly goddamn well that Nie Huaisang listens to no one but himself, and so is the closest to an actual power behind the throne.)

(The poverty of the Nie sect is real. Nie Huaisang is not, in fact, a good sect leader. Nie Huaisang is specialized.)

(Nie Huaisang is constantly on the verge of a nervous breakdown. The amount of time he spends lying under a blanket in his room overwhelmed by the demands of being the chief cultivator is absolutely genuine. The best kind of lies are the kind that are real.)

In order to establish the proper first impression, Nie Huaisang is crying from overwhelm when the delegates arrive. The crying is also real.

*A term for a friend; roughly similar to Wei-bro

"- can I help you?" Ligaya asks. "Are you injured or sick?"

"My bird died!" he wails.

"I'm sorry to hear that. Is there someone else we should meet with while you're still grieving?" she inquires.

"Barbarians usually talk to Sect Leader Wei! The Nie clan is too honorable to do trade. Except he is making a lot of money, and trade can't be that dishonorable if Hanguang-Jun is doing it! I don't know, I don't know, I just don't know!"

"Some of our colleagues are talking to Sect Leader Wei," she says.

"Well, then, why are you talking to me! When my bird is dead!"

"Would you like us to talk to some of your advisors instead?" Ligaya asks patiently.

"I don't understand why you're here in the first place!"

"We're here to - sell some things, and give some things away, if that's a better way to put it than 'trade', and to see if your people are interested in joining Vanda Nossëo, the federation that produces all those things and is very rich and powerful."

"Are you from America? I didn't know they had normal people in America."

"All of us are from different worlds. You can't get to different worlds by traveling through space, no matter how far you go," Ligaya says.

"I think they mention that in the books of the Lan!"

"Really? That's interesting. Anyway, we'd be happy to talk to advisors or assistants of some kind while you recover from the loss of your bird."

Dammit. He has no idea which power-behind-the-throne to refer this to. Or, he does, and the answer is Wei Wuxian who already has things under control.

"--oh, but I wouldn't know which one to pick! Why don't you tell me what you're doing and maybe I can figure it out?"