"...That is likely a longer story than I should tell here," After Mingjue's had a moment to digest and Xichen considers his answer. He's never been one to lie, but there are things better left vague if Mingjue hasn't yet experienced them.

At least, to some degree. "...You sent him to his father several months into the war, but as far as we knew, he vanished. He eventually surfaced in the Wen camp but he was working as a spy for us, at the time and it was his information that allowed us the progress we made with the war. However, while he was spying, not everything he had to do was necessarily a good thing by our standards, given he was trying to get close to Wen Ruohan." Xichen pauses again, folding his hands in his lap and not quite meeting Mingjue's eyes as he speaks.

"He was the one who killed Wen Ruohan at the end and it earned him a place in the Jin sect and we later became sworn brothers after everything had settled down."