( He is the wagon. No, their bond. No, Wei Ying. No —

He cannot decipher.

There is a point past which Wei Ying devolves into childlike innocence, into the rushed inability to concoct the particulars of honest conversation. When he is at once an opaque, obscure scholar, too overwhelmingly intelligent for the audience who spectates him, and an utter fool.

This is that moment. Lan Wangji, who has worn patience like a mantle, dresses in it once more — and, after a pained few moments, turns on the video setting of the pendant to focus on his hand, where the clumsiest paper cart has been folded, the 'wheels' hanging on by literal thread. He pulls on it, the paper wheels shifting more left-right than in rotation. )

I shall carry you. ( But, by the looks of the wheel that unpeels off the string at the next tug, not too far. )