Wangji quickly trailed after Wei Ying, but found that he had lost track of him already. How can someone be so slippery?

Wangji begrudgingly started his search for that menace as he made his way through the side of the mountain.

 Wei Wuxian, hmph, what a troublemaker. Gosh, he's so frustrating; how can somebody even hold that much audacity in such a lithe body? As if it wasn't enough, I'm missing class to find this scourge, Wangji thought as he kept walking. 

I think it's safe to say that Wangji needed to work on not getting too caught up in his own thoughts. If he had, he would have noticed the person following a little way behind him. 

"Whatcha thinking about?!" Wei Ying jumped out from behind a bush and then fell back when he felt something cold hit his face and sent him to fall back.

"Pftp! What on earth!" Wei Ying clutched his face. Was that snow?

Wangji looked at his hand covered in frost and quickly put it behind his back. Oh, god, he lost control again. Damn this menace! 

"Eh, Second Young Master Lan, did you just... throw snow at me?" Wei Ying haltingly said, still on the ground. 

No, that wasn't snow; it was too hard, and there wasn't a trace of snow anywhere else. Wei Ying felt his hair and found it frozen on the ends. Throwing snow at someone can't do that. 

How did he do that? Wei Ying furrowed his brows as he got up from off the ground. 

"Second Young Master Lan, there's no need to resort to violence." Wei Ying chuckled.

Wangji's eye twitched in irritation and disapproval, the muscles around his jaw tightening. Without a single syllable escaping his lips, he seized Wei Ying by the sleeve and yanked him away with a force that left no room for argument.

"Ey, Lan-er-gongzi, where are you dragging me to?! Hey, slow down! Hey, Lan Wangji!" 

                                                                                          ✿

"So stiff." Wei Ying muttered from his desk as he glared at the Second Ghost of Lan. 

Wangji sat regally at his own desk and expressionlessly read a book. Well, he wasn't really reading it. He was far more concerned with the fact that he had just blasted Wei Ying with ice. That wasn't good, no matter how much he deserved it. 

He lost control yet again, and it really started to get to him. I mean, he was the most controlled and composed person there was. Surely, he should be able to get it under control. 

"Lan-er-gongzi, is that book interesting?" Wei Ying smirked while Wangji continued to ignore him. 

Wangji kept a straight face as he tuned him out, while the smile on Wei Ying's face only grew. 

"Well, it must be a misprint. Y'know, considering that you're reading it upside down." 

Wangji looked like someone pinched him as he looked at his book to find all the characters upside down. 

"Wow, Lan Wangji, you must be really talented to be able to read upside down!" Wei Ying doubled over. 

"Be quiet and copy," Wangji said through gritted teeth as he put the book down while Wei Ying wiped a fake tear from his eyes.

"Alright, I'll quit annoying you." Wei Ying put his hands up in surrender, while Wangji just huffed.

"But, um... Where did you get the snow from? I didn't see any snow around where we were." 

Wangji's stoic expression faltered briefly as he paused in contemplation. With a shake of his head, he averted his gaze downward, lost in thought.

"Fine then." Wei Ying huffed.

But he wasn't going to let it go this easily. He'd studied talismans since he was young, and he would surely know if there was one that could make the ends of your hair freeze on impact. 

No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't shake the feeling that they had met before. There was just something about him that some deep part of him recognised.

"Oh, come on, what was it? Was it a talisman? Were you hiding it in your pocket and waiting for me? I need to know!" 

No answer.

 Wei Ying grumbled something under his breath but just focused on his desk. 

Young Master Phantom and the monster under the lake. 

Huh, that sounds like the name of some novel young maidens read, Wei Ying mused as he began absent-mindedly drawing. 

Maybe the monster was his pet or something. Yeah, that could be it. A scary-looking guy like that, so it makes sense that his pet would be just as scary. 

However, it seemed like more than that, and it would drive him to insanity if he didn't figure it out. He never thought he'd actually want to stay in such a stifling place, but as long as this mystery was unsolved, how could he leave? 

Wangji watched Wei Ying out of the corner of his eye. It was almost funny how you could basically see the gears in his head turning as he chewed on the end of his brush, head resting on one hand. 

 The sunlight streamed in through the window behind him as the rays lit up his hair, letting all the different shades of brown show through. 

It was actually kind of mesmerising. 

When he's not making trouble, he's almost handsome, his inner voice oh so helpfully added. 

Shut up!, he told his stupid inner voice. 

God, there must be some way to get rid of that. 

Wei Ying could feel the Jade Ghost's eyes on him, and decided to have a little fun. 

"Hm, it's a nice day today. There's a good breeze, too." Wei Ying mused out loud, taking a wistful breath in as he leaned back. 

"Maybe I should rent a boat and head out on the lake. I'm sure there are tons of things to do. Wouldn't you say, Lan-er-gongzi?" 

Wei Ying lazily glanced in his direction while Wangji looked well and truly done dealing with him.

"Oh, come on, won't you say something?" Wei Ying said in a saccharine-sweet tone, while Wangji ever so slightly rolled his eyes. 

"Fine then, forget about the lake. What about you?" 

This time, Wangji actually looked up, just a glimpse of confusion showing on his face. Wei Ying fought the urge to call him cute and continued. 

"Well, I've asked plenty about the lake, but what about you?" Wei Ying rested his hand in his hands. 

 "Young Master Phantom, what about you? Just what are you all about?" 

"I..." Wangji faltered but then raised his eyebrow. 

"Phantom?"

"Uh, well... I thought you knew about that one, hehe." Wei Ying muttered, not quite meeting his eyes. 

Wangji shook his head once again. He seemed to be doing that a lot nowadays. 

"Seriously, what are you like?" 

Wangji thought about it for a moment. What do you say to that? What are you like? What kind of question is that? 

"Do you not know? Fine then, I guess I'll tell you." 

"You're indifferent to people, composed and elegant. The perfect student and the epitome of a Lan." Wei Ying listed off of his fingers. 

"But... you're also a bit shy and awkward when you think nobody else is around." 

"What?" Wangji looked up, not sure whether he should be offended at that.
Awkward? Shy?  

Nobody had ever described him as awkward or shy... And yet, I guess he was awkward, wasn't he? Lord know, these last few days, he had been nothing but downright embarrassing. 

Wei Ying watched as the emotions went through his face. For that brief moment, he didn't really care about the lake monster or the snow. He would be happy just watching him think.

"But! Uh, you're not just that; you're also really good at hide and seek and hiding snow in your pockets." Wei Ying awkwardly laughed.

"No one's ever called me that," Wangji said out loud.

"What, good at hide and seek? I'm surprised. " Wei Ying laughed a melodic-sounding laugh. It sounded like a flowery spring breeze to Wangji's ears. 

"No...shy." Wangji looked away, while Wei Ying had the inexplicable urge to take his chin in his hand and make Wangji face him. 

The wind blew in through the window, gently moving a few strands of raven hair on Wangji's head. The sunlight glinted on Wangji's brown eyes, lighting them up a gorgeous shade of hazel that was like looking into two pools of honey. 

"Oh, wow." Wei Ying blurted out.

"Hm?"

"No, uh, nothing." Wei Ying scratched the back of his head.

"Uh, Lan Wangji, I-" the afternoon bell cut off Wei Ying. The pair looked out of the window to see that the sun had already moved to the highest point.

"Um, I said I would go and see my Shijie and Jiang Cheng." Wei Ying said, but didn't move after a while. He reluctantly got up to leave, lingering by the threshold before he went around a corner.

"Goodbye," Wangji muttered. 

Oh, we're saying goodbye now? His inner voice sounded playful.

I'm really done with you, Wangji responded as he got up to clean his desk.

The wind blew in again, rustling some papers on Wei Ying's desk. One of them got caught in the breeze and moved over to Wangji's side of the room.

"Hm?" Wangji picked up the paper.

'...Is that me?'  In the picture, he was holding an ink brush, and a water lily was in the bottom right corner. The brush strokes were perfect and captured everything.

Wangji peered outside the door where Wei Ying had just been a moment before.

"I guess he isn't the worst," he mumbled as he folded up the portrait and put it in his sleeve, his ears light pink.