Work Text:
Well, first of all, nowhere in MDZS canon we see an emperor, even though we have "emperor's smile". Maybe it could have another meaning, maybe it could be translated in another way, don't know, I don't speak a word of Mandarin!
So! Emperor!
What if MDZS's world HAD an emperor? More than that, a big ruling family, many wives, many children, concubines by the lot, ministers, counsellors, all the stuff, and everyone more or less bound by family ties to an old emperor (like, 80 or 100 years OLD) that DOESN'T! PASS! THE! THRONE!
Doesn't even choose a crown prince (!!!!!), because he knows that the moment he chooses someone, he's signing his own death sentence. So he just keeps pushing the matter of the crown prince for later, wich leads to a lot of trouble in the government, causing fragmentation of the power into parties that support one prince or the other and takes everyone's and their mother's attention from any social unrest.
In this context, sect leaders would be something like lords and the area under their direct command pays the sects to keep the land free of supernatural beings (wich would kind of explain the titles of 3-zun and the Lan leading family's -jun). I'm thinking about the land close to their sects, directly under their command, being their true property and all the lands that are not theirs being divided between larger and minor sects for protection. Those areas outside their direct domain would pay a fee of some kind for the sects services.
The thing is, in this way the sects areas of influence overlap with the lands of other lords (non cultivator). Some Lords would be like "Pay the sects? ok, great! I don't need to organize a party to hunt demons that would certainly kill us all!", but there would be other Lords who think "f*ck the sects, I can take care of my property, I can organize my own militia, hire some rogue cultivators to teach them and then I will have trained loyal servants that deal with weird things AND pay obeisance to me!".
So, the story (novel canon) should happen during a span of something like 20 years, right?
Counting from the time the Jiangs go to Cloud Recesses to jiggy's expiration date Guanyin Temple and the final tidbits, it should't be more than 20-22 years.
My take is, what if, back in the day, Wen Ruohan and Jin Guangshan's father (Jin Zongzhu at the time) had known by some means that inside the government there were some people that wanted to suppress the power of the sects, diminishing their influence or even extinguishing them. The emperor on the other side would be more or less in favor of the sects because they bring a lot of revenue, cultivator goods that serve as protection for the palace (and himself) and the sects kind of patrol the lands, wich reduces the work of (and the risk to) the yamen, also with the sects as an inland patrol and the yamen keeping the peace, the army may focus on the borders.
Then both of the sects leaders, Jin and Wen, decided to take some measures to prevent the extinction of their sects.
The Jin resorted to bribery (women), spies (women), banquets and wine (women), goods (women) and anything that could tie the Jin to the government so as to guarantee that if the Jin fell, everyone would fall as well.
Wen Ruohan on the other side, created an aMaZiNg (crazy) plan to bring all cultivators together under his banner. For that, he, being the chief cultivator, would take over all the treasures, the knowledge, the cultivation tools and would become an immortal himself so as to defeat any army, any number of soldiers and protect his people.
None of them seek help from other leaders because of pride (stupidity) and fear of the word getting out.
Well, Jin father dies (strive for immortality/die young by the lot =D ) and Guangshan becomes Jin Zongzhu, but while he is very aware of politics, his interests lie on wealth, power and women, so he kind of forgets about the matter of "government threat" very quickly.
At this time, Zangse is roaming the world and meets with people (Lan Qiren, Fengmian, Changze, Guangshan, Yu Ziyuan, MingJue's mother...). Qinheng-jun meets his future "wife". Zangse convinces Changze to marry/elope with her and Fengmian marries Ziyuan (maybe it's their parents arrangement?).
After that, Fengmian's father dies and Mingjue's father becomes sect leader officially (even though he's been the de facto leader for five years since HIS father has been in a clear descent to madness.). MingJue himself is already 2 years old but will not remember his grandfather).