Wei WuXian suddenly murmured, “… Lan Zhan.”
He reached out and grabbed one of Lan WangJi’s sleeves. Lan WangJi had always been beside him. He immediately bent down and whispered, “I am here.”
Wei WuXian hadn’t woken up yet. His eyes were still tightly shut, yet his hand didn’t let go either. He seemed to be dreaming, muttering, “… Don’t… Don’t be angry…”
Lan WangJi seemed somewhat surprised. His voice was gentle, “I am not angry.”
Wei WuXian, “… Oh.”
Hearing this, as though he finally felt assured, his fingers loosened.
Lan WangJi sat beside Wei WuXian for a while. Seeing that he was motionless again, he was about to stand up when Wei WuXian grabbed him with his other hand, hugging his arm and refusing to let go. He shouted, “I’ll go with you, quick, take me back to your sect!”
I've always thought that the choice to have this be the scene we get right after the flashback of WWX's first show of Ghost Cultivation. More so because, during that scene, we stay out of WWX's head for its entirety. To the point we get some extremely rare LWJ's PoV moment.
With how frequent WWX's PoV is during MDZS, the juxtaposition comes across as extremely purposeful.
It's implied that WWX was dreaming about that exact flashback, after all. And hence, that some part of him had, at the time, wanted to say that. Either at the moment or later on, in hindsight. He hated angering LWJ and wanted to trust him and take on his well-intentioned yet misguided attempt to help.
A peek at part of WWX's actual feelings at the moment, at a moment where reading his unfiltered thoughts would have given us too much information.
The thing is that, at that moment, he had just returned from the hell that is the Burial Mounds. He has just given his Golden Core away and took up Ghost Cultivation in a desperate attempt to survive. He's still grieving the life he had given up.
Getting help — getting support had to be oh-so-tempting. Although LWJ did a terrible job conveying his concern, it's there.
Lan WangJi, “It is not that I want to denounce him.”
Jiang Cheng, “Then why do you want him to go back to Gusu with you? Second Young Master Lan, at such a point in time, the GusuLan Sect doesn’t work with the others to kill the Wen-dogs and is instead still hanging onto its inflexible ways?”
One against two, Lan WangJi still refused to back off.
That said, I don't think WWX could afford to see it that way. He couldn't afford to believe that, if he explained things properly, how the Ghost Path actually worked, LWJ would understand (Even if it's something we know he ends up doing!).
It's just way too risky. Disregard even the Lans' rigidity: even if WWX were to believe that LWJ has his genuine best interest in mind, to get support regarding his missing core and ghost cultivation—to even discuss the pros and cons of his choice—meant potentially confessing a secret WWX fully planned to bring with him to his grave.
For WWX, to assume the worst possible interpretation of LWJ's actions probably has more to do with how much easier it makes things. Not an inability to believe that LWJ may want to help.
That way, WWX doesn't have to acknowledge the part of him that wants to take LWJ's offer up. He can push away LWJ without risk of having his secret uncovered. It's a boundary forcefully set both for LWJ (to keep out of WWX's business) and for WWX himself (to not feel tempted to ask for help he knows he shouldn't get).
To me, this aspect of their relationship at the time becomes even more interesting when one takes into account their meeting in Yunmeng, where LWJ once again brings up his concerns about Ghost Cultivation and asks WWX to come with him to Gusu for the second in-story.
After a while of silence, Lan WangJi replied, “I am the one who was out of line.”
Wei WuXian, “Not really. But, indeed, looks like I shouldn’t have invited you up here. Today was because of my presumption.”
Lan WangJi, “It was not.”
Wei WuXian smiled, his words polite, “Really? That’s good, then.”
He finished in one gulp the half cup of liquor that was left, “But, no matter what, I should still thank you. I’ll take it as you’re concerned for me.”
Wei WuXian waved his hand, “Then, I won’t bother HanGuang-Jun any longer. Let’s meet again if the chance comes up.”
WWX is obviously hurt tremendously by it (even as he reticently leaves the door open for genuine concern!), and even complains to Jiang Cheng about it.
When Wei WuXian returned to Lotus Pier, Jiang Cheng was wiping his sword. He lifted his eyes, “You’re back?”
Wei WuXian, “I’m back.”
Jiang Cheng, “Your face looks terrible. Don’t tell me you ran into Jin ZiXuan?”
Wei WuXian, “Worse than Jin ZiXuan. Guess who.”
Jiang Cheng, “Give me a hint.”
Wei WuXian, “Wants to lock me up.”
Jiang Cheng frowned, “Lan Zhan? Why is he at Yunmeng?”
Wei WuXian, “No idea. He’s in the streets, probably searching for someone. After the Sunshot Campaign, he hasn’t brought this up in such a long time. Now he’s at it again.”
To me his wording is a bit of a deflection, a way to explain away his turmoil without actually putting a finger on why the situation was so upsetting to him. But once he's alone and a bit calmer, having spoken with JYL (funnily enough about romantic love) and eaten some comfort food, he admits the truth to himself:
Squatting in the yard, Wei WuXian put the empty bowl onto the ground. He gazed at the stars sprinkled across the sky, and then smiled.
When he ran into Lan WangJi in the streets, he recalled many things from when he was studying at the Cloud Recesses.
On a whim, he stopped Lan WangJi, wanting to direct their conversation toward those days as well. But, Lan WangJi reminded him that everything was different from how they were back then.
Yet, when he returned to Lotus Pier, to the Jiang siblings, he’d be under the illusion that nothing had changed at all.
His actions has been motivation by a desire for normalcy, for the budding relationship they had back in Cloud Recesses. He had wanted to run away from his present reality for a second, to pretend it was all fine. That he hadn't lost his core, that he wasn't gradually becoming a pariah in the Cultivation World — his life unraveling in front of his eyes.
LWJ's decision to bring up his concerns, as misguided as they may be, hurt first and foremost because they dragged WWX out of this little moment of escapism he had been trying to build for himself.
When you consider both scenes (and the implications of both) together, it paints such a sad picture to me. WWX wants to bond with LWJ, wants to pretend his life isn't going to hell slowly but inexorably; but the only thing he gets from LWJ are reminders of the situation and forbidden temptation — offers of help he cannot afford to trust, much less take.
WWX is highly resilient, someone who focuses on the positives of life and pays as little mind as possible to the bad, but things are just getting worse and worse for him. He isn't getting a chance to grieve what he lost properly, and he's on the path to lose even more things. For someone like him to seek out escapism like that talks of how bleak everything must have looked to him at that point.
I don't think WWX was actually convinced LWJ's actions were meant to imprison him, even if he had concerns about how LWJ saw him at the time. Taking the offer in bad faith, however, kept anyone from probing too much on why he was rejecting the offer, hid the actual source of his own pain and kept at bay the temptation to accept help he couldn't trust or take without ruining everything.
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