Letters to My Partner in Crime
is a Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation: Mo Dao Zu Shi fanfiction written by pupeez4eva.
Jin Zixuan is hoping that his engagement to Jiang Yanli will be cancelled after his fight with Wei Wuxian. Instead, much to his frustration, he finds himself being forced to exchange regular letters with her.
He is expecting little from this correspondence. The last thing he expects is to be dragged into a matchmaking scheme to pair Wei Wuxian up with Lan Wangji of all people.
Letters to My Partner in Crime provides examples of:
- Alternate Universe Fic: It becomes this, when Madame Jin gets involved to personally ensure Jin Zixuan and Jiang Yanli's engagement doesn't get broken off like in canon. In response, Wei Wuxian doesn't get expelled for punching Jin Zixuan and Jin Zixuan is forced to start exchanging letters with Jiang Yanli. From there, it only devolves from canon.
- Awful Wedded Life: Jin Zixuan lampshades that when thinking about his parents' marriage.Jin Zixuan: When Madam Jin wanted something, you generally gave it to her; unless of course you were Jin Guangshan, and then it was basically your role to disappoint her. His mother had been let down so often by his father, and Jin Zixuan loathe to disappoint her too.
- Cannot Spit It Out: It takes a lot for Lan Wangji to confess his true feelings towards Wei Ying. Even after, Jiang Yanli and Jin Zixuan get involved, its still a very close call and takes considerable effort of his part thanks to being Emotionally Tongue-Tied.
- Character Development: Slowly, Jin Zixuan definitely gets this when he starts writing letters to Jiang Yanli.
- It's first seen after they start writing letters and he realizes that Jiang Yanli is enjoyable to talk too, only to later to come to the realization that he considers her a good friend. Then while helping getting Wei Ying and Lan Wangji together, he starts coming to terms with himself on how horribly he treated Jiang Yanli previously without even giving their Arranged Marriage a good chance. To his shame, it's even more a kick in the gut after he figures out he fell in love with her. Though, to his credit, he does make it up to her and apologize.
- Death Glare: Both Lan Wangji and Jiang Cheng deliver this expertly. Justified in both Lan Wangji and Jiang Cheng's case given Jin Zixuan was purposely trying to invoke a negative reaction from Lan Wangji and Jiang Cheng's death glares towards Jin Zixuan are very understandable due to Poor Communication Kills.
- If You Ever Do Anything to Hurt Her...: Justified in Jiang Cheng's case, thanks to Jin Zixuan treating her terribly due the Arranged Marriage between them to and Lan Wangji previous behavior towards Wei Wuxian.
- Longing Look: According to Jin Zixuan, he noticed Lan Wangji does this a lot towards Wei Wuxian while in detention together much to his obvious horror and embarrassment.
- Love Revelation Epiphany: Justified in both Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian cases. After, Lan Wangji finally manages to confess to Wei Wuxian and come to term with his feelings for him with Jin Zixuan and Jiang Yanli help. Wei Wuxian realizes his feelings after his confession and also comes to terms with his newfound realization that he loved him for a while.
- Love Triangle: Subverted and majorly Played for Laughs because Wei Wuxian thought Jin Zixuan to be in love with him and to make matters worse he knew Jiang Yanli loved Jin Zixuan,, who was her fiance, in the first place! Jin Zixuan, on the other hand, has no idea of Jiang Yanli's love for him or why Wei Wuxian started avoiding him after they first started getting along! The truth of this whole mess is due to lots of misunderstandings. Really Jiang Yanli always loved Jin Zixuan and the guy himself never held any sort of romantic feelings towards Wei Wuxian, instead he developed feelings for Jiang Yanli.
- Marriage of Convenience: It's the whole core reason why Jin Zixuan and Jiang Yanli's are in a engagement, in the first place. Thankfully, by the end of the fic, it is not the only reason. Unfortunately, you can't say the same about how Madame Jin and Jin Guangshan's marriage turned out, if you can even call it that.
- Nice Girl: That honor goes to Jiang Yanli despite her trying to play matchmaker for Wei Ying. She really does love and wants whats best for him. Not to mention, she easily forgives Jin Zixuan later on after how horribly he treated her.
- No Social Skills: Lan Wangji in a nutshell. It takes a lot of intervening on Jin Zixuan and Jiang Yanli's part for him to get his happily ever after earlier then in canon.
- Oblivious to Love: Wei Wuxian, no question. Even after, he's still unsure when Jin Zixuan literally spells it out for him but since Lan Wangji is emotionally tongue tied and almost can't get his confession to Wei Ying out.
- Official Couple: Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji at the end, much to the horror of Jiang Chang and Jiang Fengmiang and to the amusement of their sister.
- Poor Communication Kills: All over the place here and in a lot of instances its majorly Played for Laughs.
- When Jin Zixuan was trying to put Lan Wangji to the test if he had feelings for Wei Ying or not. He invited Wei Wuxian out alone for a drink at night to try to get Lan Wangji jealous. But due to being on bad terms with both of his brother-in-laws it was highly suspicious if he only invited Wei Ying. So, instead he lied about inviting Jiang Cheng not making it. Which made his actions more suspicious to both of them in retrospect and made them suspect that he had feelings for Wei Ying, instead. This also made Lan Wangji suspect that as well and soon let his displeasure known much to Jin Zixuan's horror.
- Thanks to absolutely terrible timing on Jin Zixuan's part and Dramatically Missing the Point when, at the exact moment, he realized his feelings for Jiang Yanli. He tried blurting it out, to Wei Ying of all people, that he had feelings for her without actually having to admit it. Unfortunately, due to Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng suspecting that Jin Zixuan actually had a crush on him, he just ended up Digging Yourself Deeper with the idea that he was actually in love with Wei Ying and was trying to confess to him then.
- Lastly, to make everything even worse, when Lan Wangji when he first thought Jin Zixuan was helping him confess to Wei Ying, all the misunderstandings came back full circle. Wei Ying and Jiang Cheng accused him of falling in love him much to everyone's confusion. Lan Wangji thought he just toying with his heart on his crush on Wei Ying.
- Shipper on Deck: As shown in her letters towards Jin Zixuan, Jiang Yanli definitely ships Wei Ying and Lan Wangji together. To the point, where she's willing to question Jin Zixuan on their relationship in school and come up with a matchmaker scheme to get them together. She even manages to rope Jin Zixuan in the scheme after convincing him that they have feelings for each other. Later, he gets actively more involved in trying to make them a couple if only to stop seeing them flirt so obviously anymore and maybe impress her.
