Jin Guangyao shakes his head. If it hurt himself to put it so bluntly, the return from Lan Xichen was even more, and he tries to soften it a little inside as well. For as much as he can't stand the way that things have fallen between them, he doesn't really want to hurt Lan Xichen so much. It's just that either honesty or lies, with the bond between them making so many small feelings clear, either way will cut.

"But you didn't disappoint me. You were one of the few people who, despite your position, accepted me when I was scorned by everyone else around me. Your presence always made me happy, before," he replies more gently as troubled emotions ebb. And I would have done anything for you, to see you happy in return, only that seems like a mockery to say now. "I suppose you doubt even that now, but it is true." Surely you can understand how, after all that, how much this doubt and questioning weighs too heavy on him?

Jin Guangyao doesn't think he's so mistaken either; it's one thing for Lan Xichen to say that he knows not all things are so clean, but that is still so far from Jin Guangyao's personal experiences, even past the war's end, by circumstance... or intentional omission.