#People really forget how political MDZS's world is
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mm the thing with madam qin and jgy and honestly a bunch of situations in mdzs (which is why i love it so much!) is that no matter what choice you make, everything still sucks. there's a chance that everything won't suck, but it's as likely as winning the lottery.
mme qin have been raped by an incredibly powerful man who's also her husband's admired superior and political ally. a woman being raped is not only mortifyingly humiliating for her, but also for her husband. what certainty did mme qin have that qcy wouldn't have divorced and cast her out, or even killed her, after finding out? even if he was the best man in the world and he assured her she's the love of his life and nothing would ever change that, the sect is still subsidiary to lanling jin. they can't do shit.
and this is the societal and political side -- we can't forget about the woman herself, about her trauma, about the fact that she gets pregnant and gives birth to a child, a daughter, and lives with her. if jgy can't stand to be in one room with his son, a product of surprise incest, but nonetheless a loving relationship, then how must she feel, knowing that this little girl beloved by everyone is a child of rape?
i get being frustrated with her as a character whose acts contributed to a tragedy, i've been there too and now rereading that one post i regret it because it's kinda unnecessarily aggro towards mme qin! but literally what could she have done? and let's not assume she just sat and did nothing. jgy says he and qs had to fight for the permission to marry; mme qin was probably doing her best to stop them from doing that, but what ammunition did she have other than "son of a whore, i don't trust him", something that qs would have immediately disregarded and qcy -- disregarded after either seeing or jgs agreeing that his son is a hardworking, filial good man? nothing.
same for jgy's side, the "he should have told qs" -- okay, but when? and then what? what certainty did he have that she wouldn't have flipped out, panicked, said the same things she said to him when she got the letter from bicao? of course, there was a chance of her freaking out at first, then calming down, deciding to end the pregnancy and live as siblings, but how big this chance was? how safe and effective would it be to secretly take a mix of herbs from an unknown source? how soon would everyone start wondering why is she not expecting, is jgy impotent, is she barren, did she change her mind, is he so diseased and disfigured that she ran away screaming, etc, etc?
i've seen people calling jgy all sorts of names for talking about reputation and the conference, but while it sounds monstrously uncaring to qs and shows in a twisted, sad way how changed jgy's priorities are from those of a "normal" person, he's... not actually wrong per se. he's just bypassed, packed all the emotions one would normally feel in this situation and squished them into a dark locker at the back of his mind, and went straight to Trying To Stop The Worst From Happening. because it really IS the end for both him and her if the incest news get out, and someone -- two people, possibly even more, but he doesn't know that -- is out there, KNOWING it. they can do whatever they want with this information, and once they do, suicide or faking your death and running far, far away is the only option. and qin su KNOWS THIS. this is why she kills herself, aside from shock and grief. once even one (1) more person knows about her situation, everything is ruined. hell, i can't imagine how qcy must have felt when he returned from his trip. his son(s?) must have been either at the conference or at home, but there's no mention of them at the meeting in the lotus pier. i wonder how they managed it later on, when everyone knew.
and finally, if mme qin told qs -- then what? qs would be shocked and confused. she'd hate it. she'd ask why her mother waited for so long, if her father knows; depending on the timing she could already be pregnant. EVERYONE INVOLVED WOULD HATE THIS SITUATION SO MUCH.
and like... i kinda get why mme qin "waited" until the last impossible moment. she may have begged jgy to call the wedding out, but she must have known it was too late. but had he and qs not been so intent on getting married no matter what, qs wouldn't have been pregnant, and while this reveal would still be shocking and miserable to jgy, at least he would be able to tell mme qin he won't touch her. and i feel that maybe she was hoping for something like that? maybe they could sit qs down and tell her, or maybe jgy could pretend he's not interested in sex or even kissing and qs would spend the rest of her life in a sexless and childless marriage that's nonetheless as happy as it can get. but it was impossible! that's the tragedy, no matter what angle you look at it from, everything sucks and is horrible.
there's no way out! mdzs is full of situations like that that don't involve characters taking insane risks and being 100% confident in predicting the other characters' reactions, and also society getting cool about a bunch of things real quick
#i remember seeing people saying that qs wanted to tell everyone about what jgy has done to her -- does anyone have a source?#idr seeing something like that in the novel but maybe it was another adaptation#shrimp thoughts#but also something re: the remains of the qin family -- before i read the extras i've only heard a couple of times that there's a qin-gongz#*gongzi and i was EXCITED because omg! qs's family! ......lmao. as if. THANX MXTX
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I think it’s easy to forget that Wei Wuxian is strongly villain-coded. We see the story from his perspective, we know his reasons and justifications, if you’re watching CQL and paying attention you can figure out the core transfer before the reveal. We know that Wen Qing and Wen Ning are good guys. We know that the Burial Mounds gang is a bunch of tired uncle/aunts trying to grow some stupid radishes, a four year old, and the Disaster Bi Gang (none of whom have swords, even!) We know that Wei Wuxian has his heart in the right place, that he feels an incredibly strong debt to the Wen Siblings and by extension their remaining family, that he has no golden core and has no choice but to forsake the sword and cultivate the demonic path, that he defects from the Jiang sect in a fake fight with his brother so that the Jiang sect won’t suffer the consequences of his actions, even though they have Secret Soup later.
But if you’re not us, the audience? If you’re, for example, Sect Leader Yao?
Hey did you all hear about how Wei Wuxian got kicked out of the Cloud Recesses for violently lashing out at the Jin sect heir?
Hey did you all see how he doesn’t carry his sword any more and claims it’s because he’s so badass that he doesn’t need it? And he has that Stygian tiger seal, so maybe it’s not bullshit? Can you even fight against that with a sword?
What kind of power does this guy even have? He’s a teenager! He drinks all the time and he’s moody and surly and holy shit did you hear what he did at that Wen outpost? He tortured all of them to death! Ugly stuff, man. Gruesome way to go. Maybe even worse than what Wen Ruohan did, at least a hot poker doesn’t make you claw your own eyes out.
Oh shit, he just stormed into this banquet and just SAID “if I want to kill someone who can stop me” and he still has that tiger seal I think we should be worried???
He just busted a bunch of Wen cultivators out of prison! And then he ran off to the Burial Mounds??? And his sect leader didn’t even know anything about it? Is he going rogue? Is he starting an uprising? This demonic cultivation stuff really seems to be corrupting him!
Oh man he got kicked out of the Jiang sect? You mean even the man he grew up with, who he was raised with practically as a brother, can’t control him any more? Did you hear about his fierce corpse? They call him the Ghost General! He’s unstoppable! What are we going to do if he comes for us?
He could be building a whole army in there, Sect Leader Jin said so! Who knows what kind of sick, twisted stuff he’s getting up to! Don’t forget all that horrible shit in the Sunshot Campaign, remember when he was raising the Wens’ own dead to turn against them? He could do that to us! He’s working with the Wens now, even! He’s gone totally crazy!
We can’t let some outlaw have all this power. It’s putting the safety of all of us at risk. What if it’s just another Wen Ruohan waiting to happen? (especially applicable if you’re thinking he’s using Yin iron as in CQL!) If we let him consolidate his power too much, then he’ll be unstoppable!
HOLY SHIT he murdered the Jin sect heir and his cousin with his fierce corpse! That’s the man his former shijie married! The one he punched in the Cloud Recesses, remember when the Lans kicked him out because he was so unruly and disrespectful? Yeah! It was probably revenge! Have we done anything to him? Oh gods what if we’re next???
A major point of MDZS/CQL is how important reputation is, and how that affects everything. Wei Wuxian’s reputation is straight-up villainous. We, the audience, know that he’s trying his best, that he’s a traumatized teenager with a shitload of emotional baggage trying to do the right thing and repay a colossal debt, that he’s made choices that he now has to try and live with, etc. But to the rest of the world this guy has fucking lost it, he’s gone off the deep end and he has an incredibly powerful weapon and a mode of cultivation that seems to corrupt you and turn you into a monster, and frankly, they’re not wrong! It does affect his temperament and he does end up killing a lot of people and he is out of control!
MDZS/CQL is interesting precisely because we’re getting an entire Villain Apology Story. A long time ago I read a post by someone on here saying they find Jiang Cheng challenging to write about because he’s the protagonist of a different story, and he really is. He’s the guy whose former shixiong turns into a villain in pursuit of power, the Obi-Wan to WWX’s Anakin, the one who sees how incredible power corrupts and is obligated to fight against it. Having to fight against a former ally who was seduced by “the dark side” (in this case, demonic cultivation) is a story that gets told over and over, but always condemning the one who went to the dark side. He’s the blackened protagonist, the aren’t you tired of being nice, don’t you want to go ape shit power fantasy, where we as the audience can justify his actions because we know he did it to save his brother, his sister, the Wen remnants he owes a debt to. He isolates himself from the people who love him to protect them, he refuses Lan Wangji’s help because he’s convinced he just wants to lock him up and stop him from using demonic cultivation because he’s a righteous upstanding Lan (totally unaware of LWJ’s intense crush, obviously). He jokes about it but he knows he’s being painted as the villain, and he’s in denial about how much that will affect him, because after all… he’s the Yiling Laozu, and he knows his power. But so does everyone else, and they’re rightfully terrified!
And yet? When he comes back, LWJ still wants him, still cares for him, will move heaven and earth to protect him. JC cares about him so much he’s having a Constant Crisis about it. And WWX has not forgotten his shijie or shidi, immediately cares about Jin Ling, and still is the man who really just wanted to be free and grow some goddamn radishes. He accepts that he paid for what he’s done with his death, and just wants to start over.
It just drives me nuts when people pretend like WWX was an angel who did nothing wrong because the whole POINT is that he was a villain-coded gay (well, bi) and the man you had to really watch out for was the polite, thoughtful, soft-spoken one that worked his way up from a tragic backstory. It’s a whole subversion and it’s awesome!
#mdzs meta#wei wuxian#yiling laozu#of course wwx has a good heart but remember when that kid shot an arrow at him and he threw it right back through his heart?#remember when JC and LWJ walked into that Wen outpost and were like oh fuck oh man what the fuck?#remember when he almost busted out chenqing to murder JZX over a SOUP MISUNDERSTANDING?#this is not a wwx hate post this is a pls understand complex characters and nuance post#that audience knowledge is NOT character knowledge#is this a lowkey NMJ defense post? yes.
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Hello, I just saw this weird take on the MDZS Short Fics on ch 4. 'He actually wasn't really mediocre, he was ranked 5th in the best-looking young gentlemen in the cultivation world and in terms of skill and knowledge in the 6 arts (this was before the sunshot campaign too). Wei Wuxian was always ahead, thats true but Jiang Cheng was always a step behind. He kept up his pace and considering Wwx is a literal genius I'd say its pretty damn impressive. (1/?)
. He kept up his pace and considering Wwx is a literal genius I'd say its pretty damn impressive. Plus though he’s not very good at manipulating people, but he generally has a pretty good sense of which ways the political winds are blowing and he almost always knows what’s going to annoy, infuriate or enrage. (2/?)
It’s why he gets so twitchy when Wei Wuxian starts doing stuff that’s going to land him with a Reputation. he has custom virulence perfectly tailored to his target’s insecurities and weaknesses. Very good at making people mad. He's good at organization and logistics. He walks down that mountain and manages to pull together enough of a clan to start fighting the Wen, making allies, and looking for his brother, and I don’t think he could do that if he wasn’t pretty good at both of those things. (3)
TLDR: good at reading a room, organization,leadership and logistics. Drive as we. And lastly you remember that cute disciple in nightless city that was like 'Oh look! The ghouls aren't attacking us! Senior brother didnt forget us after all!'' The next scene we see him dead and a zombie slashing Yanli's back. That chip was earned. Sorry about the other guy, and for the long read :) I had a lot of feelings today and needed them out. (4/4). Tbh I think this one just didn't understand MDZS at all.
Well this person may have not even read MDZS since they're referencing cql here... so I'm going to go ahead and take their "meta" on the story and characterization, and gently, tenderly, carefully place it in a 🌋...
jc may have been number 5, still hilarious that he's less eligible even as a Clan heir than WWX, but in the present he's banned by the matchmakers courtesy of his personality... so ...
Also, do people think: "he has custom virulence perfectly tailored to his target’s insecurities and weaknesses." is a positive thing the way it manifests in jc? Like: He can be the biggest asshole in the room and make everyone miserable and he does 🥺🙌. you dropped this 👑 💩 king.
He doesn't utilize it to manipulate a situation for the better. He just uses it to shit on other people. Usually the good people. Now JGY for example uses that ability in a savvy way to throw his opponents off balance and gain the upper hand. jc? jc just knows how to hurt ppl for the sake of hurting them.
You know who else knows how to play on someone's temper but isn't consistently an asshole for it? Wei Wuxian. He uses that strategically in the Xuanwu cave to get Wen Chao away from Wen Zhuliu so he shift the odds in their favor and help MianMian, Jin Zixuan and Lan Wangji - and really everyone else in the cave who was going to be forced to face the Xuanwu without their swords.
jc gets twitchy when WWX is doing the right thing bc let's say 20% he also wants to be seen as a hero but he's too self absorbed and selfish to put in the work...which brings us to the remaining 80% of his motivation- which is that he doesn't want to inconvenience himself to help someone else.
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Mousie’s absolutely subjective, very biased Top 10 web novels list
Please note that this is hardly aiming to be objective, if one can even be properly objective about a work of fiction. It is 110% based on my preferences, which means this list is heavy on the angst and has nothing set in the modern day. It is also heavily danmei-centric, even though I read way more het romance than danmei, because for whatever reason, most of the danmei I’ve read has been insanely good.
10. Return of the Swallow - one of the two non-danmeis on this list. Smart and nuanced and with a large cast of characters. Our heroine is a long-lost daughter of the family that is brought back in and has to cope with familial struggles, crazy royals, court intrigue, invasion et al. It’s SO GOOD! There is romance with the sexy smart enemy general but honestly, it’s the heroine that is the main selling point for me.
9. Transmigrator Meets Reincarnator - the only other non-danmei novel on this list, this was my very first web novel and what drew me into this insanity. This is just a ton of fun, probably the lightest novel on this list, not an ounce of angst to be found. But it’s hilarious and features competent heroine and tsundere hero and I will always love it for opening a new world to me. Anyway, our heroine transmigrates into the novel as the female lead. Unlike the original lead though she doesn’t want to seek adventures and angst - she just wants to comfortably live with the wealthy, nice husband heroine has. Alas, said husband is no longer nice since he has previously lived this story where he was betrayed by FL and then transmigrated/reincarnated into the past. Oh well, the heroine opens up businesses and makes friends. And eventually, her husband realizes his wife is way different this time around. This actually doesn’t have much romance, not until close to the end, but this is so fun I don’t care.
8. Lord Seventh - I am only partway through this so far, but it’s already on the list because it’s smart and somehow intense AND laid-back (not sure how this works, but it does) and is honestly just a really really solid and smart period novel, with the OTP a cherry on top of a narrative sundae. Plus, I love the concept of MC deciding he is not going for his supposedly fated love - he’s tried for six lifetimes, always with disaster, and he’s just plain done and tired. When he opens his life in his seventh reincarnation and sees the person he would have given up the world for, he genuinely feels nothing at all. (Spoiler - his OTP is actually a barbarian shaman this time around, thank you Lord!)
7. Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation (MDZS) - oh come on, how are you even on this tumblr if you don’t know MDZS/The Untamed? This was my very first danmei and it’s so much fun! I love everything about it - the unreliable narrator, the looping structure, the main OTP, Wei Wuxian’s laidback, traumatized insouciance, everything. Anyway, the plot in the event you somehow transported here from 2005 is that the Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, Wei Wuxian, was defeated by the righteous sects over a decade ago and fell of a cliff to his death. Only now that same Wei Wuxian opens his eyes in another body and everything that was supposed to stay in the past starts again.
6. Heaven Official’s Blessing (TGCF) - people either love its meandering narrative, picaresque structure and cast of thousands, or find it a detriment compared to much more compact MDZS. I love it even more than MDZS for those very qualities. It does have a rock-solid, darling OTP, but what really elevates it to me are the MXTX trademark combo of snarky/light tone hiding a ton of trauma underneath, the insanely intricate world-building, and what it has to say about the nature of grace and goodness. Xie Lian is one of my top 5 web novel characters and probably in top 10 from anywhere. Oh, and while MXTX’s stuff is not as angsty for me as Meatbun’s or even Priest’s, there are always exceptions, and there is one chapter in this novel that pretty much broke me and sometimes I still flashback to it and feel unwell.
Anyway, what is it about? There is a commotion in the heavenly realm - Xie Lian, the Crown Prince of a long-destroyed kingdom, has ascended to Godhood. That in itself is not so exciting. However for Xie Lian this is the third time (!!!!) as he’s ascended and lost his godhood twice prior. And now, the biggest joke of the divine realm is back, throwing the heavenly realm into chaos. And elsewhere, Hua Cheng, one of the four most powerful demons of that Universe, sits up and takes notice.
5. Golden Stage - my perfect comfort novel. Probably the least angsty of any danmei novel on this list (which still means plenty angsty :P) It also has a dedicated, smart OTP that is an OTP for the bulk of the book - I think you will notice that in most of the novels in this list, I go for “OTP against the world” trope - I can’t stand love triangles and the same. Anyway, Fu Shen, is a famous general whose fame is making the emperor antsy. When he gets injured and can’t walk any more, the emperor gladly recalls him and marries him off to his most faithful court lackey, the head of sort of secret police, Yan Xiaohan. The emperor intends it both as a check on the general and a general spite move since the two men always clash in court whenever they meet. But not all is at is seems. They used to be friends a long time ago, had a falling out, and one of the loveliest parts of the novel is them finding their way to each other, but there is also finding the middle path between their two very different philosophies and ways of being, not to mention solving a conspiracy or dozen, and putting a new dynasty on the throne, among other things. It always makes me think, a little, of “if Mei Changsu x Jingyan were canon.”
4. Sha Po Lang - if you like a lot of fantasy politics and world-building and steampunk with your novels, this one is for you. This one is VERY plot-heavy with smart, dedicated characters and a deconstruction of many traditional virtues - our protagonist Chang Geng, a long-lost son of the Emperor, is someone who wants to modernize the country but also take down the current emperor his brother for progress’ sake and the person he’s in love with is the general who saved him when he was a kid who is nominally his foster father. Anyway, the romance is mainly a garnish in this one, not even a big side dish, but the relationship between two smart, dedicated, deadly individuals with very different concepts of duty is fascinating long before it turns romantic. And if you like angst, while overall it’s not as angsty as e.g., Meatbun stuff, Chang Geng’s childhood is the stuff of nightmares and probably freaks me out more than anything else in any novel on this list, 2ha included.
3. To Rule In a Turbulent World (LSWW) - gay Minglan. No seriously. This is how I think of it. it’s a slice of life period novel with fascinating characters and setting that happens to have a gay OTP, not a romance in a period setting per se and I always prefer stories where the romance is not the only thing that is going on. It’s meticulously written and smart and deals with character development and somehow makes daily minutia fascinating. Our protagonist, You Miao, is the son of a fabulously wealthy merchant, sent to the capital to make connections and study. As the story starts, he sees his friend’s servants beating someone to death, feels bad, and buys him because, as we discover gradually and organically, You Miao may be wealthy and occasionally immature but he is a genuinely good person. The person he buys is a barbarian from beyond the wall, named Li Zhifeng. It’s touch and go if the man will survive but eventually he does and You Miao, who by then has to return home, gives him his papers and lets him go. However, LZF decides to stick with You Miao instead, both out of sense of debt for YM saving his life and because he genuinely likes him (and yet, there is no instalove on either of their parts, their bodies have fun a lot quicker than their souls.) Anyway, the two take up farming, get involved in the imperial exams and it’s the life of prosperity and peace, until an invasion happens and things go rapidly to hell. This is so nuanced, so smart (smart people in this actually ARE!) and has secondary characters who are just as complex as the mains (for example, I ended up adoring YM’s friend, the one who starts the plot by almost beating LZF to death for no reason) because the novel never forgets that few people are all villain. There is a lovely character arc or two - watching YM grow up and LZF thaw - there is the fact that You Miao is a unicorn in web novels being laid back and calm. This whole thing is a masterpiece.
2. Stains of Filth (Yuwu) - want the emotional hit of 2ha but want to read something half its length? Well, the author of 2ha is here to eviscerate you in a shorter amount of time. This has the beautiful world-building, plot twists that all make sense and, at the center of it all, an intense and all-consuming and gloriously painful relationship between two generals - one aristocratic loner Mo Xi, and the other gregarious former slave general Gu Mang. Once they were best friends and lovers, but when the novel starts, Gu Mang has long turned traitor and went to serve the enemy kingdom and has now been returned and Mo Xi, who now commands the remnants of his slave army, has to cope with the fact that he has never been able to get over the man who stabbed him through the heart. Literally. This novel has a gorgeously looping structure, with flashbacks interwoven into present storyline. There is so much love and longing and sacrifice in this that I am tearing up a bit just thinking of it. If you don’t love Mo Xi and Gu Mang, separately and together, by the end of it, you have no soul.
1. The Dumb Husky and His White Cat Shizun (2ha/erha) - if you’ve been following my tumblr for more than a hot second, you know my obsession with this novel. Honestly, even if I were to make a list of my top 10 novels of any kind, not just webnovels, this would be on the list. It has everything I want - a complicated, intricate plot with an insane amount of plot twists, all of which are both unexpected and make total sense, a rich and large cast of characters, a truly epic OTP that makes me bawl, emotional intensity that sometimes maxes even me out and so much character nuance and growth. Also, Moran is my favorite web novel character ever, hands down.
Anyway, the plot (or at least the way it first appears) is that the evil emperor of the cultivation world, Taxian Jun, kills himself at 32 and wakes up in the body of his 16 year old self, birth name Moran. Excited to get a redo, Moran wants to save his supposed true love Shimei, whose death the last go-around pushed him towards evil. He also wants to avoid entanglement with Chu Wanning, his shizun and sworn enemy in past life. And that’s all you are best off knowing, trust me. The only hint I am going to give is oooh boy the mother of all unreliable narrators has arrived!
The novel starts light and funny on boil the frog principle - if someone told me I would be full bawling multiple times with this novel, I’d have thought they were insane, but i swear my eyes hurt by the end of it. I started out being amused and/or disliking the mains and by the end I would die for either of them.
#cnovel#2ha#yuwu#to rule in a turbulent world#lsww#sha po lang#golden stage#return of the swallow#transmigrator meets reincarnator#lord seventh#grandmaster of demonic cultivation#heaven official's blessing#the dumb husky and his white cat shizun
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The only reason I more than love Jiang Cheng - apart from him being very much my type in both looks and personality (yes, I know, I hate that I like people who mock my very existence too but eh I can't change it) and the very appealing potential of him having a softer side underneath all that prickliness that you have to work through to ever be able to see - has almost everything to do with him being a Sect Leader, or well, being responsible for many people's lives and a legacy and actually doing a great fucking job at it.
Because, personally, I believe that leadership in general, fundamentally changes a person, and I relate a bit too much with people who are kind of forced (peer pressured? put into a position that they know they aren't suited for or don't want at all because of insecurities or something by the expectations of people around them) into that kind of responsibility.
And well, this is the only reason why I disliked wwx being the protagonist (not him as a protagonist, mind you, because he's a wonderful one, just the fact that all the canon events are being told from his perspective) because the leadership thing isn't really explored, and by god, if it had then mdzs would forever be the most perfect work of art in the world in my opinion.
I mean there was potential for it - the 'what if Yilling Wei Sect was actually a thing?' and yes I love that, but a) canon already states that wwx had good leadership skills (and while reading him be a total badass in politics because of his observation skills would be really fucking delicious, I think I would want to read more about fucking up - something that you're truly at fault for - and then dealing with its consequences) and b) that neither he or the wen remnants survive the mob mentality thing long enough for it to be a concrete enough idea. I get why it didn't become a thing in the time they did have, because they just wanted to be left alone man. ah fuck here come the tears-
As far as I remember, Yunmeng Jiang as a sect flourished? (correct me if I'm wrong) and even if they had the advantage of 'being the one to get rid of the evil demonic cultivator even after having such personal ties' with how easily public opinion can be changed, I doubt it would have lasted long, especially in the face of Jiang Cheng's constant terrible personality so in the 13 or 16 years when wwx was dead, it wouldn't have meant much.
Which brings up the question of "how the fuck is Yunmeng Jiang still standing then if Jiang Cheng is majorly responsible for making the decisions" Only reasonable conclusion? Jiang Cheng was a good leader.
Again, being a good leader long-term does not equal being a good person (like jiang cheng was a good leader but he wasn't a good brother or a friend) but it does mean you have to be a decent human being that can empathize with other people, specifically the people you have to take care of, which means no, despite being an antagonist - Jiang Cheng wasn't a monster of the likes of Wen Ruohan and Jin Guangshan. He wasn't a tyrant (as far as I've interpreted, because I dont remember reading any instance of Jiang Cheng interacting with Yunmeng Jiang or vice versa my brain forgets easily except that they respect him. Not fear him to the point of following orders to protect their lives, because if they did then, while there won't be a war, people working under him defn wouldn't have helped bring Yunmeng to what it is or had been sob and there's no way a Sect can actually thrive with just capable leaders)
So Jiang Cheng, being a good leader, hence a decent person who successfully raised a child (with issues but hey nothing good friends and emotional support in the form of a resurrected uncle and a safe haven like Lotus Pier can't smooth over) is total badass for it too-
I'm getting off track but the point I want to make is that, I would give up my limbs to read any good content about Jiang Cheng fumbling through leadership and its burdens during those years wwx was dead and actually doing a good job (i mean, with his circumstances though I defn believe for every important battle he won, there were some battles he lost too)
It doesn't even have to be about Jiang Cheng - though I do have a soft spot for him, and I think that's major because while he was the antagonist in canon, wwx loved him for whatever reasons, and because of those nameless reasons, i fell in love with him too - anyone in a similar situation would be very fucking interesting.
NMJ -> similar in personality and circumstances to Jiang Cheng, with the added conflict of Wen Ruohan being alive and all the possibilities that brings in, handling a sect, raising his brother and being a general of a fucking war in his what? TWENTIES? and then dying, remembered as a righteous man (with generally no complaints or bad gossip) who died tragically? BRuh. Nmj is amazing. I love him.
LXC -> Since his personality is wildly different (kinda similar to how I think i would personally be as a leader ngl and maybe that's being kind of arrogant, but then again there are critical downsides to his methods) because there are expectations. Heavy ones, and ugh do expectations suck. jc and nmj may have like, lost the people whose opinions matter most to them but lxc hasn't, and the idea of him being terrified to someday make a bad enough decision that he wouldn't be able to face his uncle or his sect again hits me right in the feels. But he's a good sect leader despite of it, and that's very sexy of him.
NHS -> okay he's shit at being a leader. I have to say it. Nhs you defn fucked up. Unlike all the previous sect leaders, and unlike wwx, your reasons for doing what you did was personal revenge and it ruined your sect. But you know what? I love you for it. I love that you ended up doing things to avenge a man who would rather have chosen to die as painfully as he did again than be avenged through those methods. The idea of you not being able to ever look your brother in the eyes if he ever came back because of what you did, and then not regretting your terrible actions because its not like he's ever going to, is he is fucking painful and I live for it. You are defn not a decent human being, maybe the in between the extremity of wrh and the gray jc/nmj/jgy, but yknow what? I dont give a fuck. I love you.
JGY -> again wildly different but honestly I feel the same about him that i feel for Nhs. Quoting what I saw in a comic the other day, "a-yao deserves a little murder-"
Jin Ling -> i think most of the things said about nmj and jc covers him lol
Well this was a mess, but if you made it this far, please this is all a cry for help and maybe some begging as a last resort to suggest fics along this theme, because I am craving and searching and coming up empty-
if you have fics please recommend some T__T I will forever owe you my emotional stability
#mdzs#wei wuixan#jiang cheng#yunmeng jiang#nie mingjue#lan xichen#nie huaisang#jin guangyao#leadership#did i tag this right#ramblings#uhh i kinda gave up at the end#i am just. exhausted lol
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I posted 3,134 times in 2021
237 posts created (8%)
2897 posts reblogged (92%)
For every post I created, I reblogged 12.2 posts.
I added 707 tags in 2021
#the untamed - 166 posts
#mdzs - 155 posts
#jiang cheng - 137 posts
#wei wuxian - 74 posts
#jiang sect - 36 posts
#tgcf - 32 posts
#jin ling - 31 posts
#lan wangji - 30 posts
#danny complains - 25 posts
#tian guan ci fu - 21 posts
Longest Tag: 139 characters
#like yeah they’ll be polite because they won’t shame jc but they’re also going to make it clear they’re no ally and they’ll watch the other
My Top Posts in 2021
#5
HONESTLY Jin Ling being like *eyeroll* “yeah well your personality caused these problems UNCLE” and Jiang Cheng’s only response being *glare* *mutter* is a HIGHLY UNDERRATED INTERACTION. That’s how you know they are so comfortable and familiar with each other! That is the interaction of two people who know each other’s flaws and still love each other! And I love them.
These two heckle each other so much out of love! Jin Ling has absolutely no fear of his Jiujiu except for the one moment he does something really fucking bad and even then he’s just like “but Jiujiu… I’m baby 🥺. Shushu tell him, I’m baby.” And Guangyao says “look at him, he’s baby” and Jiang Cheng goes “…. yes okay, I forgive you. You’re a shit I love you so much” except with an eyeroll and not getting on his case for lying and escaping with a criminal
So many bad takes are about “Jin Ling is actually terrified of Jiang Cheng! He’s abusive and doesn’t love him! Once he keeps seeing Wei Wuxian he’ll realize he doesn’t want anything to do with Jiang Cheng! He doesn’t actually like being around him!”
Like… they’re each other’s favorite person in the world! Jin Ling feels so comfortable with him that he even just blabs that “Not even my Jiujiu has hit me! He just says that!”
Jin Ling starts crying publicly and Jiang Cheng just pulls him close, makes it clear that anyone who says anything will face his wrath. Which is NOT something either of Jiang Cheng’s parents would have allowed, something that Jiang Cheng would be within his right to say ‘Hey, clean yourself up. You’re an heir, wipe your tears.” And what he does instead is go “come here, tell me what’s wrong… you can’t speak? Okay let’s go somewhere private, no one will say anything, no one will hurt you, you’re safe’ with his actions of calling him over and pulling him close to carefully comfort him alone.
Jin Ling openly snarks and talks back to Jiang Cheng and even when Jiang Cheng snaps at him for being a dumbass and running into danger at the temple, Jin Ling still feels immediately safe by his presence and the fact that he actually let Jiang Cheng take care of him after being so horribly betrayed by Jin Guangyao speaks volumes. The only time Jin Ling is actually afraid of Jiang Cheng is after the most traumatizing event of his life involving one of his caretakers being willing to kill him and nearly doing so and Jiang Cheng does what he always does and the moment Jin Ling shows fear, Jiang Cheng backs down and takes him home instead.
I have so many emotions about these two I could write an essay
449 notes • Posted 2021-11-13 22:52:00 GMT
#4
Thinking about little baby toddler Jingyi who never quite manages to stop running once he figures out how to stand and manages to full on tackle Lan Xichen into the ground atleast three separate times and each time Lan Xichen laughs, almost a little too free (because honestly after the war? Such liveliness is a blessing he can’t curb) as he stands himself and the little gremlin up. He grins, just barely skirting that ‘don’t be too joyful’ rule, and reminds Jingyi not to run for his own safety… before sending him after Sizhui and Lan Wangji who are walking past. When Jingyi manages to tackle them both down, Lan Xichen turns away to hide his smile but it still lingers as he looks at the others
Every Lan disciple in the vicinity suddenly forgets about the no staring rule and wonders if they can convince Jingyi to knock him down again to make him laugh again.
512 notes • Posted 2021-09-13 23:12:08 GMT
#3
Do you ever think Wei Wuxian forgets that Jiang Cheng is now 36+ and is absolutely bewildered when Jiang Cheng complains about his back or says his knee aches when it rains because?? Brother is baby?? Brother is baby brother??? He shouldn’t be old?? What??
Jiang Cheng meanwhile is just like “IM NOT FUCKING OLD I JUST WENT THROUGH A WAR AND DON’T HAVE A FRESH BODY YOU FUCK ASS! IM ONLY 36!”
Jin Ling agrees that Jiang Cheng is indeed Old. Lan Xichen and Lan Qiren both try to ‘helpfully’ offer Jiang Cheng some helpful herbs or remedies while Lan Wangji is eternally smug that he has the Cold Pond and gets to avoid it.
Jiang Cheng regrets mentioning his back hurts one fucking time because “I am not old you shits! Put up your sword I can still kick your ass!” But his juniors just keep insisting he shouldn’t strain himself and he can’t tell if they’re just being brats or genuinely think that 30’s are old and either way he’s not having fun.
589 notes • Posted 2021-11-20 22:09:01 GMT
#2
I am Thinking about Nie Huaisang who doesn’t care. Nie Huaisang who honestly doesn’t know if Wei Wuxian is actually evil or not, if he actually became a demon. Nie Huaisang who willingly took a gamble being well aware that Wei Wuxian could come back wrong and twisted and lay death on Jianghu and decided that was fine.
So many thoughts seem to hinge on NHS being almost completely certain that WWX isn’t actually evil, didn’t actually lose his entire soul to demonic cultivation. I’m here for Huaisang who’s spent the last ten years in absolute terror of being killed because he’s not obedient enough, in absolute terror of being found out, in absolute terror of never being able to even just find his brothers body.
Who’s pushed to the brink because of that terror, because of that anger, that heartbreak, that agony. And he decides he doesn’t give a fuck how Wei Wuxian returns.
If he’s still the Wei Wuxian that Nie Huaisang remembers then great! Wonderful! His plan will work perfectly, probably! But if he’s not? If he’s a tormented destroyed soul of resentful energy and absolutely nothing else? If he really is the mass murderer everyone calls him and comes back with that same killing instinct?
Then Nie Huaisang will dump the oil in front of him to lead that fire straight to Koi tower first and accept his fate of being burned with the rest of the world. Because he is Tired, he is Scared, and he is so very very Angry.
One way or another he will burn the world that Jin Guangyao created at the expense of his brother. He will burn it down to the ground with rivers of blood and the flames of war if he has too. He has nothing left, he is not adored by the Nie Sect, his only other friend is a broken man on the other end of Jianghu who spends his time only with his nephew, his second brother doesn’t care to look at Jin Guangyao with anything but affection, and the man who he once lived beside has his hands coated in the blood of Huaisang’s big brother. He has nothing, he has nothing. And he will make sure Jin Guangyao dies with nothing too.
830 notes • Posted 2021-10-02 20:18:08 GMT
#1
Not to say that Jiang Cheng has definitely semi-raised half the disciples of Yunmeng Jiang via Jiujiu energy but Jiang Cheng has semi-raised every disciple more than two years younger than him via Jiujiu energy
He knows every single disciples name, their history, their likes and hates. He can rattle off every punishment they’ve received in the last four years, what he got for their birthday, how many times they’ve fallen in the lake, and how much time they’ve spent going through classes because physical punishment does nothing for these dumbasses.
At any given moment he is thinking about the disciples who were injured, tracking the ones who went out on missions, assigning lookouts for the ones who have taken too long to return home, and planning what he’s going to yell at them for making him worry.
He has been called “shushu” or “jiujiu” by them more times than even he can count, he rages every time but it’s a mark that the cultivator is Officially Jiang and he sighs and turns a blind eye (and occasionally slips funds in for) when they throw a party to ‘welcome’ the poor embarrassed cultivator.
He has kept every item ever given to him by his people, yes even the horrible scribbles passed over by four year olds who don’t even know who he is they just think he’s pretty. His bedroom is just covered in knickknacks and occasionally if he gets one he really likes he will put it purposefully at the end of his table over dinner and it’s an internal fight every time to get something he’ll like enough to show off.
(YES it’s ridiculous, YES it’s childish, but this is still Yunmeng Jiang and these cultivators, these members of the family Jiang Cheng dragged from the ashes of his home and made anew have given him everything they have and more so yes when they’re home they can have their little jokes and their little trinkets and he will let it all happen because it means they’re happy and they’re safe and they know they will always always have their sect leader at their back. When they’re outside they’re standing behind their sect leader, they will never falter. But when they get home? Their sect leader stands behind them and watches over them in all the million tiny ways only a sect leader can so they have their freedom in safety)
870 notes • Posted 2021-08-14 22:18:49 GMT
Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →
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Ok so like
NOT disagreeing with you on the servant thing - for I'm sure you're right on that
But i feel like YZY was more than simply aggressive. Like, the novel even says that she punished WWX for things everyone else did and got a slap on the wrist, if that. I won't rlly get into the customs and politics of it, but from a psychological point, she was an abusive authority figure
oh 100% she had it out for wwx, i’m not disagreeing on that part at all. I think ppl think I’m like out here defending her aggressive behaviour, and I’m not doing that.
I’m just saying sometimes i think people forget she’s not wwx’s mom and they treat her like she is, or analyze her relationship with wwx with the same criteria they use on her relationship with jc and jyl and i’m just like...guys pls it’s not even remotely the same.
And then ppl are like oh it doesn’t matter, wwx is a kid, you can’t treat a kid like etc etc etc, and yeah they’re right. You shouldn’t mistreat a child, ever, period, full stop. And this will sound like the weirdest fucking shit ever, but I gotta be honest: if YZY was a character on Game of Thrones, I’d 100% be like yo this shit is fucked. But YZY is an asian mom, so I look at that and I’m like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I can’t explain it, but what I feel makes sense to me, and based on the comments I’m getting in my inbox, it makes sense to A LOT of asians and asian diasporas out there. We just...don’t see it as abuse. You can tell us we’re wrong, fine okay we’re wrong, you win, but that’s not gonna change how we feel about yzy or about our own parents.
Look, my parents never beat me. Imma lay that out there. As strict as they were, they did not condone corporal punishment and I don’t condone it, I would never in a million years. Still, I look at YZY and I’m like lol yeah I’ve been yelled at like that plenty. Literally lol.
And I will quote my roommate who is also cn-diaspora, very in touch with her roots, very deep in BL novel culture, she read the original mdzs in chinese before cql came out on netflix (actually she was the one who introduced me to it), she said to me: omg are they claiming that’s abuse. If that’s abuse, then my mom is abusive, and all our parents are abusive.
So to the non-cn, non-cn diaspora people who are pissed off about my yzy stance: okay, be pissed off, don’t let me tell you how you should feel. If yzy triggers you, then she triggers you. Plain and simple and valid. Sometimes what you feel and how you see that character is not always what that character was meant to be (for example I fucking hate canon wen ning lol). Ultimately, yzy wasn’t written for you, she was written by and for a demographic that you don’t belong to and whose experiences and perceptions of the world you don’t share. Of course she’s going to elicit difference responses from different groups of people.
All I’m trying to point out at the end of the day is that yzy wasn’t meant to be this abusive terrible stepmother that tumblr fandom has somehow indicted her to be; she really wasn’t. I don’t think mxtx meant for it to be seen that way. In fact, I think she was meant to be kind of tragic. But if her portrayal reminds ppl of the unpleasantness in their lives then that’s also perfectly valid. I don’t think there has to be an argument over this.
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Plz let Airplane be EVEN MORE Awesome - Fic Rec Part Duo
*Stares at all the notes my last post got* Nice to know we are all just as Thirsty for the good boi as Mobei-Jun is.
So Thus, I have decided to make another! (Smashes the post button) Since there was a lot, I just decided to make another post.
here we go kids, more of that good Airplane love... alongside that good quality Moshang because I am biased~
(Plz share if you find more!)
a cup of vinegar, a spoon of sugar by Shamelesscooper - “Your timing certainly is impeccable, my lord,” Wei Wuxian groans, rubbing his back. “What brings you here for the second time in as many nights…?” “I left my cloak,” Mobei-Jun says, shooting Wei-Wuxian a dirty look as the bird demon shrugs his robe back on.“You certainly did!” Shang Qinghua exclaims, crossing his arms quite crossly. “You can’t just leave your things everywhere, my king!” Mobei-Jun’s hard stare refocuses on Shang Qinghua, and he can’t help but shrink back, hurriedly rummaging around in his qiankun pouch for the offending garment. As soon as Shang Qinghua finds it, Mobei-Jun takes it from his hands and throws it over his shoulders, breathing in a deep sigh as if it relieved him to have it there again. If you miss it so much, why did you even leave it behind?! Shang Qinghua almost wants to say, but he is quite fond of his head, actually, and would rather Mobei-Jun not take it off his shoulders, thankyouverymuch.
--Shang Qinghua is tasked with escorting the leader of the Yiling Carrion Tribe to Gusu, and it'd be fine if only Mobei-Jun would stop poking his (gorgeous, beautiful, drop-dead handsome) head in!
*Evil grin* here we have a delicious rare side of Jealous Mobei, Shang Qinghua doing something that most MDZS fans dream of doing once, and a side of shamelessness from our favorite ‘Lovebirds’ XD Not to mention how steamy it gets~
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You Will Never Step Lightly In The Dark by Janusoverlord - Shang Qinghua wakes up in the aftermath of Tianlang-Jun's rampage on Cang Qiong Mountain and has to navigate the delicate political situation he now finds himself in. Luo Binghe is building a harem with Shen Qingqiu as his first, and honestly most terrifying, husband. Yet, Luo Binghe seems to be turning his eyes to Shang Qinghua as a possibility as well. Excuse you? What is this? He didn't sign up for this!
Okay, make sure you read the tags kiddies because uhhh, this has some themes to it. It is also part of a series as well, but I read it stand alone and it does good with how it explains things; as it is...
Let me just say, Luo Binghe does not know what he just got into; all mortals will bow to the might of our lord Airplane! I really did like this and I am tentatively on the fence about reading the rest of the series, because the writing is so damn good but we will see how my ship cravings twist.
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With Ink and Sword by xnemone - Shang Qinghua is appropriately nervous when he passes the Imperial Exams only to be assigned not to the Emperor’s palace, but to the barren lands ruled by a lord known to be as ruthless as he is cold. Although his friend and confidant Shen Qingqiu gives him a sympathetic smile and a mountain of furs before he sets off, Shang Qinghua feels less than reassured.He expects ridicule, a harsh regime, even rejection. What he does not expect is for Mobei-Jun to take one look at him among all the scholars and servants of his palace, and proclaim him his.
Now, this is such a good story, I love it, is makes me feel happy and squishy inside with the good Moshang, and you know what? It has my new favorite thing in the world!
Shang Qinghua calls Cucumber bro out! AND IT IS GLORIOUS!!! (Seriously, why does this not happen more often?)
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Good Vibrations by Feynite - In Shang Qinghua’s defense, this whole trope was originally something he’d only ever written in for Sha Hualing, for precisely one scene.
In which I actually feel ashamed for forgetting such a treasure. Like, Feynite is a wonderful wordsmith, invoking so many thoughts and good shit with their words and characters, and by god do I end up just loving them even more then before.
This story passes the Vibe Check! (Luo Binghe also gets a Vibe Check~)
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From Your Perspective by cozycitywitch - It was nothing more than a curse, probably, and surly the witch doctor could fix it? So what else was Shang Qinghua to do inside Mobei Jun's body until the end of the night? He couldn't be blamed for his curiosity! He was only a man! Or the one where Moshang switch bodies and Shang Qinghua can't help himself.
Now, this is a lovely, spicy lime where while there is no big action or technical awesomeness going on, it does have some wonderful images; Shang Qinghua’s hamster body with the aura of a king, him showing off being intimating which means Shang Qinghua can indeed be scary, it is something that could happen if he has the motivation for it.
Not to mention this is just a hot story all around~ (My kingdom’s for My King’s POV on this~)
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ham hunt by jets_adjacent - There's a wolf at Shang Qinghua's heels and his only thought is: Northern mating rituals are a pain in the ass.
This is a really, really good A/B/O fic; it also shows just how tricky and sneaky our Shang Qinghua can be, as well as a mischievous side I just love seeing in our favorite Peak Lord. And let’s not forget the spicy goodness of this fic, which is really tasty~ (And can I get a shout out for consent and negotiated kinks!)
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In which healthy relationship skills are forcibly brought into Proud Immortal Demon Way by two bros by Rafaela271412421 - Look, if no one is going to give these people friends and healthy relationships then by GOD, I WILL do it myself!
It's about two bros bringing healthy relationships into PIDW both intentionally and not. Gods and deities, accidental and not, will also be included. Also, it's in bullet point format, so you’ve been warned.
ahahahahaahhahahahaahaha! I love this fucking outline/bullet points presentation, it is something I always end up going back to and giggling like an idiot. The is really a healing piece, my crops have been watered, my face is clear, and Airplane and Cucumber Bros go completely feral~ I love it, I want to propose marriage~
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trinkets for a king by jets_adjacent - Shang Qinghua gives many extraordinary gifts to his King. His King finally catches on. --aka: Mobei Jun has never been courted by a human before.
So, this is a wonderful subversion of the ‘Mobei-Jun courts/plans his wedding to Shang Qinghua all the while said man is unaware’. like, it is so cute and I love jelly Airplane; it gives me life. Also, one of the few we see Airplane taking full advantage of all his author knowledge and using it for the devious plans~
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The Southern King and The North Star by Luuplup - A series of meetings between the Southern King and a cultivator. The happy moments, the romantic moments, the sad moments.
Another really cute Role Reversal I find I greatly enjoy, with a very competent, beloved Lord Demon!Airplane :D it makes me happy when I read it, I end up wanting to hug something~ It seems like it will be a slow burn, what with our favorite moronsexuals, but oh is it delicious seeing the buildup~
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under a wicked star by tagteamme - Caught unaware, Mobei Jun is kidnapped for leverage.
On the eighth day, Mobei Jun is broken out of his trance by the sound of something being tossed into his pit. It’s a lot lighter than what they throw food down in. He realizes that today, he is not tied down.When he moves off the bed, he does not need the canopy post to support his weight as he stands up. The object on the floor glints in the firelight, and Mobei Jun crouches to pick it up. His face is immoving; slowly, he turns the An Ding peak lord crown in his hand, looking at the blood-soaked metal through the light.
SQH to the rescue! Alongside some good old fashioned angsty Moshang miscommunication but with Mobei-Jun’s POV this time, and some absolutely good steamy good times for all XD
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we seal our fate by ketolic (corrose) - All things considered, it really was sort of obvious. Hey! Anyone can be a genius in retrospect. Hindsight is 20/20! Besides, who can blame him! He'd never written about this facet of Mobei Jun's life before! Still...considering all the times he'd gotten his hands on Mobei Jun's sealskin, he's sort of shocked that it took him so long to figure it out.
:D This story makes me giggle uncontrollably, and still finds ways to unexpectedly stab me in the heart. I love it! Not to mention we get to see SQH be awesome! Sure, he flails around as he does it, but busts out the fighting moves and even fits a rescue in there! So good, so in character, I love every watery moment of this fic... good thing I’m so thirsty- (Is shot)
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But yeah! These are some more good stories I found, some a bit more- urrrr- thirstier then others~ you can find the first thing of Fic Recs Here! And Plz, share more awesome Airplane whenever you have a chance~
#SVSSS#Scum Villain Self Saving System#Scum Villain Self-Saving System#Shang Qinghua#Moshang#Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky
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MDZS/CQL FIC RECS (will be added to)
Did I Not Explain Why The Sunset Turns Red? (by 3988Akasha)
https://archiveofourown.org/works/27563575/chapters/67420063
Rating: Explicit
Archive Warning: Graphic Depictions of Violence
Category: M/M
Fandoms: MDZS, CQL
Relationship: Lan Zhan | Lan Wangji/Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian
Additional Tags: Time Travel, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canonical Character Death, Soulmates, Demonic Cultivation (MDZS), Original Female Character(s) - Freeform, Emotional Constipation, Minor Character Death, Sexual Content, Bathing/Washing, Idiots in Love, Poetry, Mild Gore, Angst
Personal Tags (includes spoilers): not jc friendly, not jgy friendly, bamf wwx, bamf lwj, fix-it
Chapters: 10/10
Word Count: 100,112
Wei Wuxian thinks he finally gets to die, but as he wakes up in the Burial Mounds, face to face with Xue Chonghai, he realizes death is something he'll be denied.
Soon he's back, with memories up to the point at which he fell to his death at Nightless City, and has many things to do - mistakes to correct, lives to save, and a soulmate to woo.
Armed with a greater understanding of the source of his Demonic Cultivation, the Yiling Patriarch is back and nothing will be the same.
~~~
Twelve Moons and a Fortnight (by stiltonbasket)
Rating: General Audiences
Archive Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Categories: Gen, M/M
Fandoms: CQL, MDZS (CQLverse)
Relationships: Lan Zhan | Lan Wangji/Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian, Jiang Cheng | Jiang Wanyin & Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian, Jin Ling | Jin Rulan & Lan Jingyi & Lan Yuan | Sizhui & Ouyang Zizhen, A-Qing/Ouyang Zizhen, Lan Huan | Xichen & Lan Zhan | Wangji, Jiang Cheng | Jiang Wanyin & Jin Ling | Jin Rulan, Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian & Wen Qionglin | Wen Ning, Nie Huaisang & Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian
Additional Tags: Humor, Post-Canon Fix-It, Long Distance Relationship, Epistolary, Family Feels, A-Qing Lives, Teenage Romance, Adoption, Romantic Comedy, Happy Endings, Weddings, Case Fic, Parenthood, Politics, Yunmeng Jiang Sect (MDZS), Slow Burn, Worldbuilding, Sect Leader Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian
Personal Tags (includes spoilers): Angst in the climax, endgame wangxian and chengqing, jc friendly, nice and soft and very fluffy, original characters
Chapters: 51/51
Word Count: 290,321
"Let me get this straight. You really want me to stand in for you while you help Jin Ling settle in at Koi Tower?"
"Who else do I have?" Jiang Cheng returns. "Father trained you to serve as my deputy, didn't he? And don't say you don't remember, or I'll break your legs."
"Well, yes," Wei Wuxian manages. "Uh. I'll just let Lan Zhan know I'll be at Lotus Pier until you're back at home, then."
Or, the one where Wei Wuxian spends the year before his wedding as Yunmeng Jiang's acting sect leader, and the cultivation world's greatest love story finds its happy ending with the help of three juniors, a teenage romance, and one very involved (and exasperated) younger brother.
~~~
For the Sake of a Smile (by Reikosama7716)
https://archiveofourown.org/works/25130155/chapters/60887152
Rating: Not Rated
Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Categories: M/M, F/M
Fandoms: MDZS
Relationships: Lan Zhan | Lan Wangji/Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian, Minor Everyone/Wei Ying | Wei Wuxian, Cangse Sanren/Wei Changze
Additional Tags: Older WWX, Oblivious WWX, Top LWJ, Jealous LWJ, Possessive LWJ, Protective JC, Everyone is young and gay for WWX, WWX in his YLLZ appearance, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Third Wheeling, Somebody Lives/Not Everybody Dies, Cold Springs (MDZS), Cinnamon Roll Wen Ning, Sect Leader Wen Qing
Personal Tags: jc friendly, jgy friendly, VERY fix-it, (mostly) everyone has a good time, there is still some angst, mostly mild sexual content
Wei Wuxian is deemed a troublemaker but also righteous in his own ways but how can one deny his good looks which is accompanied by his friendly personality. Many tend to forget that he is ranked fourth in the most handsome cultivators of his generation. Gods, he’s the son of the servant yet when he smiles, everyone seems to swoon or blush or maybe both.
If only a certain someone named Lan Wangji didn’t try to glare at innocent people just for staring at Wei Wuxian for more than two minutes. Can’t he spare them some mercy when there’s an available handsome bachelor right in front who isn’t a glaring statue, a pompous peacock and a grumpy faced boy with high requirements in a bride.
Yet it doesn't stop everyone from pining after Wei Wuxian.
(very sorry for the messy layout! new to tumblr shmantics)
#mo dao zu shi#mo dao zu shi fic recs#the untamed#the untamed fic recs#wangxian#wangxian fic recs#this is a mess and i am so sorry#the fics are very good tho
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i know not everyone has a background where they learn to really read and anlyze a literary piece but i think getting a bit of context should be standard (honestly i have no idea how the school system in america works) but a lot of western fans don't even bother lol like i've seen people saying WWX "learning" music in the 3 months alone at the BM is unrealistic or shocked at LXC's artistic skills like what do they think noble educated young boys were being taught ? lol do some reaserch plz!
My biggest issue with the criticism that is aimed at both MDZS and SVSSS is that they are conflated with Western YA material. I will note a lot of this is not posed towards TGCF which ultimately is the most chaste in terms of catered tastes for western YA fans.
They seem to forget that in world Wei Wuxian is a prodigy despite his status as a servant. This station of servitude is used against him as Lan Wangji and Lan Xichen are noted prodigies as is expected of their status of sect heirs. They were all raised within the gentry, but Wei Wuxian is expected to stay within the limitations of servitude in comparison.
The entire plot is a subversion of the usual wuxia/xianxia tropes that do not rely on family purity dynamics for sects and MDZS uses heavy political ruling as is expected from actual historical nobility. Cultivators in MDZS are nobility and are the accepted crop where as wandering cultivators are seen as unorthodox next to established clans. It is similar to any western fantasy tropes that use dystopian world building that relies on more jaded themes to flesh out it's unfairness.
It is not the norm of Xianxia as it is heavily politicized in it's themes or loyalty and filial piety that had been heavily downplayed within CQL. And I will reiterate the LA and the novel are two very different in analysis themes and have no resemblance to the other with their end points and relationships.
#mdzs#mo dao zu shi#cql vs mdzs#do not recommend CQL as a gateway intro for Wuxia/Xianxia I beg everyone who watchesfucking CQL first#salt? salt
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Hi.....if you don't mind me asking, what are your top 10 favorite books? And why? Sorry if you've answered this question before....
This is an interesting question, and a difficult one! Which is why I let it steep for a few days while I was in a bookbinding fugue, haha XD
I’m not sure I’ll be able to answer it, because my level of fondness is highly dependent on how recently I read a book/how many times I’ve reread it, with an optional nostalgia modifier if something made a huge impression in my youth. And when I’m picking favorites, as the number of potential [thing] expands, the more I end up dithering and fretting that I’m forgetting something HUGE as I choose. So rather than a selection of top ten, I’ll just run down through some of my favorites! I’ll split it as five cnovels (recent reads, current genre hyperfixation) and five more conventional english-language novel (realistically, probably more like series, unless a standalone book occurs to me), and I’m not going to rank the conventional novels.
SO. Regular novels first. There’s a heavy recently-read/frequently-reread element going on in here.
The Imperial Radch trilogy, by Ann Leckie. Okay, I am a sucker for a nonhuman protagonist, which is going to pop up in at least two other entries. And I’m also a sucker for themes of what can be perceived about a person externally versus their internal world, and Breq delivers like WHOA. She has SO MUCH going on in her head, and even though we’re in there with her, she still hides lots of her emotions from us. And characters like Seivarden hit me in character development buttons that I’m a sucker for, and the whole idea of consciousness being split across multiple bodies is DELICIOUS to me. Also... love me a sentient spaceship. ‘The Ship Who X’ series by Anne McCaffrey isn’t going to make this list, but I also love it a lot. (also, a universe of ‘she’s made me realized how STARVED i was for that degree of representation in certain genres that i love a lot, but don’t often see myself in as often as i might like)
The Murderbot series, by Martha Wells. Another nonhuman, sometimes-human-passing protagonist! Another one processing MASSIVE trauma of a sort that I, the human reader, have to slow down a lot and try to comprehend from an extremely different life experience! I like that a lot, it really forces me to LINGER on the nature of what a character is feeling. And oh my god, Murderbot’s voice is one of my favorite pov voices of all time. And watching it work (or go hogwild on its own asdfdgd) is absolutely delightful. I love literally everything about this series, except what happened with Miki. Other than that? Flawless.
The Books Of The Raksura, by Martha Wells. Martha Wells is a DELIGHT, y’all. Also! Another heavily-traumatized, nonhuman protagonist! And this time, like... It’s a fantasy world with huge amounts of sentient species, and the protagonist grew up away from his people, who are basically a bunch of feral homesteaders (LOVE THAT), and is trying to figure out how to reintegrate into their societal structures as an adult. That desperate desire to belong and feeling of discomfort and not-fitting-in, and the connections he makes and the way he DOES find a way to fit... like if u crey every time. Also, as far as we’re shown, it’s a cheerfully bisexual, polyamorous society, and *grabby hands*
Discworld, by Terry Pratchett. God, what do I even say about this series. It was a PARADIGM SHIFT. It’s bitingly funny, and also just plain biting, and full of huge varieties of interesting stories, set in a fascinating world, with a series of protagonists who I love too much for words. Vimes! The witches! Moist!!! They’re all so WONDERFUL. I still haven’t read the last book in the series yet, because then it will be Over Forever, and I can’t deal. This one is heavily nostalgia-tinted, but also, I stand by it.
The Belgariad/Mallorean, by David Eddings. Okay. Also very nostalgia, and the choice I can justify the least. But these books CLICKED with me. I’m afraid to reread them, because I’ve been wallowing in queer fiction for so long I’m worried about what the compulsory heterosexuality will feel like, and I know both series are very... episodic, in a way that isn’t necessarily great literature. But I dunno! Feels good, man. It’s high fantasy with a magical system I like, segmented worldbuilding of a sort that isn’t necessarily WELL-MADE, but it’s like... comfortable and easy. And something about the style and the character voices just clicks with me. I have no idea how well these hold up in the present day, but I do love them, and I’ve been planning to reread at least The Redemption Of Althalus by the same author as a standalone before I commit to a 12-book rereading of this universe, but.... I like em XD
--
Cnovels! I think I can rank these, so let’s go for it.
Fifth favorite: The Disabled Tyrant’s Pet Palm Fish :B Look, it’s ridiculous. It’s a transmigration story where the lead enters this fictional universe in the body of a fish, where he is adopted by a prince who eventually falls in love with him, and YES IT IS TAGGED MPREG, BUT HOLD ON A MOMENT-- I don’t know! I came here to point and laugh, but I’m honestly having such a good time right now. It’s really cute! And sweet! The main character is delightful, and the love interest is that particular flavor of semi-socialized upper-class young man, where like, can he do court politics? yes. can he politely express his affections for the main character? uh....... less so. It’s a really fun read, and I felt very sincere emotions about this prince who is passionately, deeply in love with his pet fish!
Fourth favorite: Mmmmmm, Mo Dao Zu Shi, I think. I struggle here, because it is NOT an easy book to read or show to watch, but having consumed the story, I love it to PIECES. I know a big draw for me is the protagonist, specifically, and his relationships to the people around him. And the more I cared about him, the more I wound up caring about the people around him, who I’d kind of neglected before, if that makes sense? It’s a story that really rewards some good old pondering. I didn’t care that much about Lan Xichen, but then I started thinking about how Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji relate to Lan Xichen, and then oh no, I care SO MUCH about his emotions, and now I’m thinking more deeply about how Lan Xichen relates to Jin Guangyao and Nie Mingjue-- It does lose points in this ranking because it IS hard to get into, and I would struggle to keep everyone straight even more if I didn’t have the show visuals to lean on, but it is still story I enjoyed VERY much.
Third favorite: Erha, but I feel REALLY, REALLY BAD that I can’t fit Yuwu on this list too, and I just want to loop them together. It’s time travel fixit fic, but it’s the book! Yes????? I love this. I love the striking character growth we get to see, and the changing perception of the world as the main character relives through events he already experienced and sees things in a new light, and I adore how Mo Ran’s growing guilt goes hand in hand with his growing love. And Meatbun in general... like, my god. I haven’t read another author who’s able to yank me through emotional whiplash so hard and fast. She makes me hoot with laughter one moment and then burst into tears the next. It’s absolutely wild. I love mxtx, and I think svsss/tgcf are gentler entry points into the genre and deal with lighter themes, but meatbun is seriously an UNBELIEVABLE writer if you can deal with the darker topics she covers.
Second favorite: The Scum Villain’s Self-Saving System :V Look, I love it. I just love it. I love, again, characters dealing with the aftereffects of old trauma, plus I do also love seeing NEW trauma piled on top of it. I love having a main character with emotional dysregulation issues who doesn’t necessarily make good decisions, but doesn’t just leave me thinking ‘jfc what an asshole’, and I think that’s a really hard balance for an author to strike, especially without us getting direct pov. I love themes of being wanted and insecurity about being wanted, which is Luo Binghe’s major, major damage. And this is my first transmigration story I ever read, and the contrast between a main character who read the novel telling us about what’s totally going to happen versus the ground shifting under his feet is INCREDIBLY delightful to me. I’ve read other transmigration stories I enjoyed, but none that got my attention quite as much as this one.
First favorite: Tian Guan Ci Fu ;u; It’s so good. It’s so well-made! It’s so LONG, and it meanders, but also, I would scream if anyone tried to trim anything out of it. I am here a lot for the ship, honestly, but I also find the plot themes VERY interesting. I am very much here for reading about characters trying to process old trauma that’s been dredged up by new events, and also very here for the themes about how characters either pass their traumas along to the next generation, or try to shield the next generation from taking the same kind of damage (see: mdzs). And I’m also very much into tempering stories about pain with like... memories of kindness, and small acts of kindness repaid with an outpouring of devotion (see: svsss). But the craftsmanship in this book is just... DIVINE. I’m always reluctant to start rereading this one, because I have a terrible time stopping. There’s nothing about this book that I don’t like.
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Blow Out All The Candles (Snippet)
(real talk - 7k in to my first foray into MDZS on a nmj/jyl fic and 5k is just pure gentle smut of their wedding night. this is them getting to know each other and learning to let their guards down and that its okay to love each other and fuck i could ramble for years. pls give feedback if you got any!!!) ((i also just realised this is 1.5k wtf am i doing))
Nie Mingjue had never peeled a lotus root before in his life, but he was finding the activity oddly soothing in a mediative way. When you added in Jiang Yanli’s gentle humming as she prepared what she needed in the kitchen around them, he was fiercely glad she had invited him to cook with her, to spend time with her in such a meaningful way. It made his heart stutter to think that she truly wanted to spend time with him, to get to know him… it had to be a step in the right direction, surely.
He had minimal knowledge of culinary skills, aside from what he needed to know when out travelling or night-hunting and making your own meal was the only guarantee of food. He knew how to skin and roast a hare, skewer a fish over a stick on a log fire, what basic berries were edible or poisonous, but he had never had the experience of making a complete home meal from scratch.
He watched as she walked with confidence around the kitchen - one he knew she had been sneaking into for a few weeks now – and he felt a surge of affection so strongly he nearly broke the knife in his hand with the sudden clench of his fist. Ah, he thought suddenly, she must feel so comfortable here. He was a fool, he berated himself, for not realising sooner. He wondered how difficult it would be to commission her own private kitchen, instead of her waiting until the cover of night and until all the cooks had left to come to the one place in Qinghe where she clearly felt most secure.
“I was never skilled in cultivation, and I know my mother was always disappointed by that,” She spoke into the still night air quietly, her eyes locked on the soup pot as she checked if the water was boiling correctly. He hummed to let her know he was listening as he kept at his task.
“As a first-born daughter to a powerful Sect leader, I was a disappointment from the beginning. Not that my parents loved me any less,” she spoke in a measured tone, collecting the lotus roots he had finished peeling. “I know my father loved me. My mother loved me too, in her own way; I just wasn’t what she wanted. I was born too small, too delicate, not suited for the exertions that came with a true cultivators life. I smiled too easily, she said, and my voice was too soft. I never spoke back, I always held my tongue, and I was underwhelming in every skill she attempted to teach me.”
She grabbed a package of herbs Nie Mingjue couldn’t name from a woven basket he hadn’t noticed earlier, and placed a small pile in front of herself and handing him a knob of ginger. “Cut it into small pieces, please,” she instructed softly, attending to her own pile of herbs.
“When it came to being a woman in a cultivators world, my mother was the exception. I think she hoped I would be too, and she didn’t know how to handle me when I couldn’t do what she did,” she smiled wanly, taking his small pile of ginger pieces and placing them in the small bowl that was blanching the pork ribs.
“I was everything she wasn’t, and I was fine with that. I was a slow learner, she always said, and it was true. Cultivating my golden core was more difficult for me compared to my brothers, and I was never clever enough with academic pursuits.”
“Everyone has their strengths,” he hedged carefully, feeling oddly vulnerable without a task to keep his hands busy. What she was speaking of was hitting very close to his heart, and his concerns with his little brother.
“That’s true,” she smiled at him with crinkled eyes, sliding him half the peeled lotus roots with a gentle, “slice them about a thumbnail thick, please.” He nodded, observing her first few slices and trying to mirror them, the same way he learned his basic sword formations all those years ago.
“I know I’m not strong, or beautiful, or skilled, but I love my brothers. They taught me nearly everything I know. They taught me patience, they taught me diplomacy, they taught me how to handle a multitude of situations -” here, she laughed lightly, shaking her head slightly at some imagined shenanigans, he assumed, “- and they helped teach me my own value. Not everyone has to be great with a sword to have worth, or have a golden core to be important. Sometimes acknowledgement, love and care, understanding, and a warm meal can be priceless.”
She grasped a pair of nearby chopsticks and fished the pork ribs and pieces of ginger out of their small pot, adding each one into the larger boiling soup pot. She then added the herbs and her sliced lotus roots in next, indicating for him to do the same. He nodded, collecting all his sliced lotus roots in a single handful - compared to the three handfuls it took her - and placed them in the pot too, a strange feeling welling in his chest as she used a ladle to mix all the ingredients together.
“I know I’m not what you envisioned in a wife, and I know others perceive me as weak,” she turned to look at him now, her gaze never wavering from his eyes as she took one of his hands in her two tiny ones, and all he could think was I have never felt hands this soft in my entire life, “but I truly hope I am able to offer something to you in this marriage. Before, I had been promised to another who never chose me and I lived my life knowing it was all my parents ever thought I was fit for. I had watched their own volatile marriage, and resigned myself to my own with a man who didn’t want me. Now we have a choice, and I want it to be the right one for both of us,” her eyes had begun glistening with tears at this point and Nie Mingjue felt his own beginning to water in response. And people call me a brute, he thought with a self-deprecating laugh.
“Lady Jiang, anyone who perceives you as weak or lacking are fools. I saw how fiercely you defended Wei Wuxian at Phoenix Mountain and how politely you tore strips off that Jin boy. You are well aware of my own reputation, I’m sure,” he snorted, knowing exactly what image others had tried to paint of him in her mind, “and to have come here regardless, and bear your heart and intentions to me, I would have to have a head full of rocks to see you as anything but my equal.”
He paused, taking a moment to really think about what he was going to say as he knew this woman would take whatever he said to heart, and it felt only right to return what she had revealed to him tonight. He placed his free hand on the two that was cupping his other, feeling his heart jump at the smile she gave him.
“I can be ill-tempered, uncompromising, and socially blunt to the point my brother has said a blow to the head would be more subtle,” he chuckled here, feeling his chest warm as Jiang Yanli huffed a laugh with him. “You are everything I am not, Lady Jiang, and that is a good thing. You are brave, and beautiful, and something I had never expected I would find in my life. Let me court you, Jiang Yanli. Let us make this work.”
Nie Mingjue was startled as new tears suddenly fell from her eyes, following the near exact same track as the last set from a few moments ago.
“I would like nothing more,” she said sincerely, her smile blinding him as he reached out to wipe them away with his thumb.
Ah, maybe time to lighten the air.
“Now, how long until our hard work bears fruit?” He asked, looking over at the soup they had made together.
“Oh, did I forget to mention that part? We will need to wait until at least morning to enjoy it,” she laughed cheekily as she pulled away from him, turning around to take hold of a small woven basket he hadn’t noticed before. “I suspected you might like something a little more immediate though, so I made something for you a little earlier.” She was blushing as she handed him the box, oddly quiet as he opened the lid.
“Your brother mentioned you liked sweet things, so I hope this suits your tastes,” she bowed slightly towards him as he looked at the delicate osmanthus cakes hidden within, marveling at the fine flower detailing on the top that he could swear looked finer than any detailing he had seen on any cake before.
“Lady Jiang, if I hadn’t asked to court you just now, I can assure you that this would have certainly done the trick.” A laugh startled out of him as he soaked in the situation. A beautiful woman, wooing him with cakes. Truly, had the world gone mad? He smiled wider as she laughed with him, her eyes filled with more joy than he had ever seen in her before.
He already had more than he had ever hoped for.
#oh my gOD I DID IT#THIS. TOOK. FOREVER.#real talk: I'm 7k in to a Mingli fic and about 5k of it is smut of their wedding night. fuck#this is like a little prelude of them getting to know each other and learning to fall in love#i headcanon nmj to be a total soft boi when it comes to romance. dude just wants to hold hands and kiss you gently.#my writing#the untamed#mdzs#cql#nie mingjue#jiang yanli#nmj#jyl#minglie#yanjue#what are we even calling their ship??#im outta the loop#jueli#mingyan#fic#my fic#blow out all the candles#m#mao dao zu shi
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Ah, but what scenes in particular did you enjoy? The wangxian ones in general? Or were there any particular ones that stuck with you?
-the axe cultivator
Oh, ac, I missed some of your question last time didn't I? So sorry. My head is kinda in the clouds these days
There are so many scenes that stuck with me, so I'll make a bullet list and probably still miss some ^^
It's such a small thing but in ep 1 the transition from the tale of how wei wuxian was killed transitions to the tea house via a shit from within sizhui's trea cup as he's pouring tea "onto the camera". It's nothing special but remember loving that shot so much the first time I watched that it was one of the things that kept me watching
Wangxian-wise in the first two episodes, I'd be remiss not to mention that handgrip when wei wuxian plays wangxian to calm wen ning down. Because it goes on ... and on ... and on. When I watched it for the first time I was like "ooohhhh so it's gonna be this kind of gay". You know the endless-longing-stares kind. And now when I rewatch it's just devastating. The last time they saw each other before this scene, they also held onto each others wrists but wei wuxian let go and fell to his death. And here lan zhan is, holding on for minutes and only let's go once jiang cheng threatens wei wuxian. Just ... 💔
i started shipping xiyao from their very furst sxebe together. Those two actors (i try to remeber their names but i always forget them again. My memory is shit when it comes to names :/) really just did want some of that sweet sweet homoerotic tension. Also, their first interaction stand out to me as the moment i really started to like lan xichen. In a setting that was shown early on to be highly hierarchical, he exhibited in the very forst scenes that he is willing to disregard someone's standing and look at their character and abilities instead. I just really love xichen ❤
Okay, i can't name one scene per episode, so let’s sum them up a little
I adore this progression during the cloud recesses and the yin iron arc from a flirtratious rivalry to genuine deep freindship and love. There are so many little moments that stand out because of the subtle acting joices made my wang yibo and xiao zhan, as well as the script, The lantern scene, when Wei Wuxian doesn’t betray the yin iron secret to huaisang and lan wangji goes “hu, so your bullshitting has reasons”, when they are in the market and lan zhan actually communicates that he doesn’t like crowds and wei wuxian pulls him closer but not into the crowd and so many others. When you watch closely, you see them realising little details about each other and I’m honestly so impressed with how amazingly the process of their falling in love was portrayed
fast forward a bit: obviously, the freaking montage quasi-fan vid in the middle of the cave scene set to their freaking love song. I remeber when I first watched this scene I actually, literally screamed. I could not believe it because their was no fucking way that this could be read as anything but romantic and I was not used to that much blatant queer romance!
A little less happy (okay a lot). The entire destruction of the jiang clan with a special mention to the scene when Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian just saw the bodies and run into fields where they fight and Jiang Cheng chokes Wei Wuxian and then they just fall back in exhaustion and sleep right there under the open sky. Everything about that scene was brilliantly done and also soul-crushing. The loss of innosence in that moment devastated me. It was so obvious that in the moment of deepest despair, all of these children’s traumas and deep-seated fears reared their ugly heads. So Jiang Cheng directs all his grief at the easiest target for his anger and Wei Wuxian just takes it because that is what he thinks is his job. And the real tragedy? This dynamic will not be broken until Wei Wuxian’s literal death. These children need therapy so goddamn badly and all they get is more trauma on top of their excisting trauma.
“The single log bridge” scene. I. Am. A. Sucker for the found family trope, especially for characters who cronically think they have to do everything on their own. So there Wei Wuxian is saying he will walk his dark path alone, but instead he finds lit lanterns and a humble feast prepared for him by people who love him. That juxtaposition kils. me. every. time. YOU ARE LOVED WEI WUXIAN! FOR YOURSELF!
(Shout out to the second time his word are refuted, this time by lan wangji and *gasp* verbally. Because there is NO better love declaration than that scene in front of basically every leader of cultivation world who politely wait for their turn to attack them)
Luo Qingyang removing herself from the narrative. I literally cry every time.
Talking about women: jiang yanli defending wei wuxian and calling him her brother. That moment is the "three things all wise men fear" quite incarnat, only it's the anger of a gentle woman
“Let me go” So ... I have SUCH a thing for couple who grapple with questions of when it is time to let go and when it is time to hold on. So Wangxian hits all my buttons. I will go further into this in my last bullet point (about the very last scene)
Oh god, this list is gonna get so long and i’m still going to forget things
In the present timeline:
Again, to sum it up, all the gentle wangxian moment where they look at each other and their entire face grows soft. Every almost-smile lan wangji sends wei wuxian, every "oh. He really loves me huh?"-look from wei wuxian. Especially in the Jingshi just after lan Xichen's loredrop. These two intensly guarded people (yes, wei wuxian is guarded,he just hides behind smiles) are so open with each other. I only have to see a guf of lan wangji with his heir down and I go feral!
Talking about that episode, the lan family backstory as a scene does things to me. And I remember watching that the first time and so much of lan wangji's behaviour suddenly making sense. Especially little lan zhan kneeling in front of his mother’s house and that being how he showed his grief really drove home just how this man exhibits emotion. I'm pretty sure that that was the moment he really became my favourite character.
Same episode and a start juxtaposition to the domestic scene between wangxian before: the talk between lan xichen and Jin Guangyao just afterwards. You could probably write an essay of meta about the parallels and differences between those two scenes and I think that's deliberate because they're back to back. The lan brother's share tea with the person closest to their hearts. One is finally able to open himself fully, the other closes up more than he ever has before with this person. The framing in that scene alone drives that message home, never mind its content. It's heart-wrenching and so well done!
Talking about xiyao: jin guangyao's death for similar reasons. Just ... arrrgh
I'm sure I've missed a ton but thus is already so long so I'll close with my favourite overall: the last scene. The parting and subsequent reunion on the mountaintop. I've stated before why this means so much to me. It is such a reassuring message to me: to have two intensely different people learn to understand and love each other exactly as they are. Being who they are, the occasionally walk different paths. But they don't limit each other. They learn to improve each other by just being there when they are and therefore know and trust that their love will return.
This was mostly cql because you asked for "scenes", but have some honorary novel mentions:
Lan Wangji: "The face says nothing. Listen to the heart-beat." 😭😭😭
The moment when wei wuxian collapses after the second siege and lan sizhui expresses surprise over this, lan wangji says something like "We are all human." I love that moment for many reasons. 1) it's one of the rare direct insights into lan wangji's thoughts. No matter how brief he is here, you don't say something like that just because. 2) and it's significant that he is the one saying it because he, too, is placed on a pedestal. In fact, I think a lot about mdzs boils down to the conflict between the inner self and outer perception and how that dichotomy can be both a deliberate shield (lan zhan being the perfect example) and a curse
I hope you and your axe are having a wonderful day 🥰
#mdzsnetcc#ask#ask game#the untamed#cql#mdzs#lan wangji#wei wuxian#lan xichen#jin guangyao#wangxian#xiyao
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I did a great foolish thing and reacted to an anti-jfm article. Now more anti-jfm articles are under my reaction and I can not forgive myself. I also want to answer everyone or just die😭
Why do people behave as if Fengmian is a bitch because he has all the power of the world and does not stand in the way of their love (yzy)? ... sorry im just tired
Ahh I'm sorry! I guess you're talking about this post. I completely understand the irresistible urge to engage when you see something so false. Sadly there's little point in having a discussion with people who reason things out like that. If they could have understood, they would have understood already. I would say just ignore them now, since you said your piece (and beautifully so) unless you're fine with an infinite back and forth that will lead nowhere. As for the post itself...
"she's not the ONLY villain." - strong start... who is saying YZY is the oNLy villain in mdzs. This was just a weird opening that makes zero sense and does a good job prefacing the absurdity that will follow. People don't think she's "the only villain" they are just tried of others excusing her tantrums and saying she's justified when the story itself makes it clear she's not.
"There was resentment within her heart. She simply wanted to let out the rage, even if it made no sense. All the rest were quiet as they endured her temper." (Chapter 52)
"her husband is just sitting there exhibiting such clear favoritism" - lol this line was written by jc and yzy ...
"so you're only here to break up this engagement if Wei Wuxian doesn't approve?" - Clearly JFM broke off the engagement because Jin Zixuan was making it good and clear he did not want to be married to YanLi or see anything of value in her, and as her father JFM didn't want her to be locked in a marriage as miserable as his own. He prioritized her happiness over making politically advantageous connections. In the setting of the novel that's an extremely loving, kind thing to do for his daughter. The fact that Jin Zixuan's one braincell then decided he wanted YanLi is not JFM's fault. In fact as the author of the same post goes to contradict themselves "ultimately I think that worked in xuanli's favor and was good for them" lol ... 🌝
"It matters that she does things specifically TO the protagonist" -yes that's how antagonists work...
"And we really can't discount the misogyny in giving JFM a pass that she doesn't get" feminism doesn't actually = giving abusers a pass and victim blaming, but go off op give us nothing.
"Who immediately was like "hey son say goodbye to your dogs (the only gift I have ever given you)" - ah let's wrap an absurd assumption in a clear innacuracy- Literally nowhere does it say that puppies were jc's onLy gift. Even using some weird reductive mindset of "if it's not written clearly it didn't happen" unless jc popped out of YZY holding a sword that's immediately discredited. OFC jc is more logically likely as a privileged Clan heir to have received other gifts that are just not mentioned bc the author assumed readers come to the story with a bare minimum of common sense... Item two, let's not forget that JFM sent the dogs away on the second day after WWX, who had been mauled by them throughout his childhood struggling for food, suffered for an entire day and still, understandably couldn't overcome his his phobia.
"Immediately, his hands went up to his face and he wailed, soon bawling his eyes out. He was in Jiang FengMian’s arms the entire day, not coming down no matter what. On the second day, Jiang Cheng’s puppies were given to someone else.
This angered Jiang Cheng so much that he threw a big tantrum. No matter how much Jiang FengMian comforted him gently"
novel: "No matter how much Jiang Fengmian comforted him gently."
op: "Like what kind of asshole says to his small child "say goodbye to your dogs here's your new brother! ok sleep tight in your new shared room I'm off to bed byeeeeee.""
.... idk ig some weird random imaginary one in op's mind
"JFM isn't strict, he just doesn't care."-
"The founder of the YunmengJiang Sect, Jiang Chi, was born a rogue cultivator. Jiang clan members valued openness, honesty, levelheadedness, and unguardedness, all of which conflicted with Lady Yu’s personality. However, Jiang Cheng’s appearance and temperament all resembled his mother’s. He hadn’t ever been to Jiang FengMian’s liking. Since birth, he taught him in many ways, yet he still couldn’t change..." (Chapter 56)
JFM is trying to shape the future Clan Leader of the YunmengJiang Clan to uphold the principles and ethos of that Clan and live by its motto. jc makes no effort to change or learn, preferring instead to pick up his mother's self absorbed, self serving, deeply classist views that resonate with his own nature. In what world would this translate to him earning his father's whole hearted approval?
"Jiang Cheng, “It served you right to be bored to death. You shouldn’t have played the hero and you shouldn’t have cared for such a hell of a thing. If in the beginning you didn’t…”
Suddenly, Jiang FengMian spoke, “Jiang Cheng.”
Jiang Cheng paused, knowing that he had said too much. He was quiet at once.
Jiang FengMian didn’t look as if he was blaming him of anything, but his expression had turned from calm to more solemn, “Do you know in which ways what you just said is not appropriate?”
Jiang Cheng’s head hung low, “Yes.”
Wei WuXian, “He’s just angry and speaking without care.”
Seeing how Jiang Cheng’s mouth and heart were still at odds, how he still felt defiant, Jiang FengMian shook his head, “A-Cheng, there are some things that can’t be said even if you’re angry. If you said them, it means that you still don’t understand the motto of the Jiang Sect, that you still don’t…” (Chapter 56)
We're clearly shown how even in the present, even after he'd already "tried in countless ways" to teach jc, JFM is still gently trying to guide him when YZY busts in and accuses him of not caring. jc is also shown again refusing to take in his father's words and instead agreeing with his mother's rant. He hurts WWX right after that scene to "teach him a lesson". The lesson being the exact opposite of what his father had tried to convey:
"As he spoke he slapped right at the middle of Wei WuXian’s chest. Although medicine and bandages had already been applied to the branded wound, being slapped out of the blue still brought immense pain. Wei WuXian roared, “Jiang Cheng!!! Come to your death!!!”
Jiang Cheng ducked from his strike and shouted, “You’re hurting so much now, but why did you play the hero back then?! Serves you right! Teaches you your lesson!”
Wei WuXian, “Was I playing the hero?! I had no other choice either, I was moving faster than I could think!"
And to be clear, JFM is literally just trying to teach jc to be a better human being, something that's actually important when someone will be handed a measure of power and influence over others. Something jc fails at miserably at as a Clan leader, as people are too terrified to go to him for help and he's teaching Jin Ling to murder and to cheat even by putting others in harm's way. It's just easier for jc to complain he's not getting praised because his father doesn't like him than to admit he needs to improve his character. Imagine if we just didn't take the words of clearly abusive people and characters, like YZY and jc at face value...
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wuxia: a general yet probably too verbose introduction to the genre, pt2
and now we get to the actual conventions -- although more accurately, these are just the ones that I either noticed the strongest or had the most difficulty adjusting to, when I was first getting into wuxia.
Not all stories have these elements, and of course in a genre as varied (and as old) as wuxia, there are twenty exceptions for every rule. What’s more, one story’s mild admonishment (”well, X is frowned on, but I guess if you’re just low-key about it”) can become the next story’s worst taboo (”omg you did X, you must be shunned! SHUNNNNNNNNNNed.”).
Like any other living genre, authors will shift/tilt convention as needed to drive a story’s conflicts.
btw, it’ll probably be a few days before I can do an introduction to MDZS, which should give time to @guzhuangheaven, @atthewaterside, @dramatic-gwynne, @the50-person, @drunkensword (and anyone else) to point out everything I misunderstood, over-emphasized, misinterpreted, or just plain missed.
--- --- --- --- --- --- ---
1. Hierarchy still matters. A student’s respect for their teacher, a child’s respect for their parents, younger siblings/students to elder. You’ll see this in how people are called (ie 3rd uncle, elder sister, 2nd brother), but this doesn’t mean everyone goes around dutiful and obedient. Err, wuxia is actually more of the opposite. I mean, a good story requires conflict between characters, and what better way than someone overturning (or at least appearing to overturn) the hierarchy?
In that vein, creating new relationships that take precedent over old relationships is anywhere from disrespectful to a full-on violation of natural law. As in, learning from someone other than your teacher, joining a new family in lieu of your birth family, running away to get married -- hell, just running away! -- are all potential sources of trouble. At the same time, wuxia has a really strong comedic streak (all the martial arts also make for great slapstick). Squabbling families with headstrong, misbehaving kids who break the rules, well, that’s a classic that can be played for melodrama, comedy, or both.
2. Swordsmanship is the pinnacle (or the most prevalent) of martial arts. The protagonist is either going to be (or end up) the best swordsman (or swordswoman) ever, or they’re going to use a weapon that’s unlike any other -- and if the latter, they’ll either be reviled for it, or lauded.
3. Despite the fact that swords are heavy and a real pain to carry around, characters carry their swords. All the time. Everywhere. In historical dramas, swords hang from belts, but not wuxia. Plus, characters will place swords on the table, across their lap, lean them against chairs, put them on the floor, and it doesn’t seem to map to whether they’re among allies or enemies, on guard or relaxing. The sword goes with them everywhere, and is always within reach. (And again, this general convention can go strict in some stories, like MDZS, where the failure to carry a sword is seen as a major breach of etiquette.)
4. The general term for ‘members of a sect’ or ‘people who study martial arts’ is ‘cultivators’. To cultivate is to grow something: cultivating [internal or spiritual] fields to gain a [skillset] harvest. Cultivation isn’t just going to the practice hall and swinging a sword three hundred times; meditation, study, even copying out texts are also ways to cultivate.
5. Wuxia characters may also be called swordsmen/swordswomen, wandering heroes, or martial heroes. If the story pivots on getting into a sect (or achieving some rank in a sect), then the characters will be considered cultivators (of a given path). If they’re introduced as just swordsmen, that seems to indicate it’s a story where sect politics plays less of a role. Or both terms may be present, to differentiate between sect-members/students versus people who defected (or are self-taught).
6. Wuxia as a genre is remarkably egalitarian. Expect women martial artists to throw down with (and hold their own against) male opponents. Learn to fear the older women in wuxia; they’re often the most dangerous. Not to say there aren’t damsels in distress in wuxia, just that there are usually as many female warrior characters, too.
If the story has multiple sect leaders, usually at least one is a woman -- and if not, one of the men is married to a woman that everyone knows is the truly powerful/skilled one. Near-equal cast percentages are common, too, both in the foreground (and not always for the sake of pairing off for romance), and in the background, when you catch shots of the rank-and-file sect members.
Basically, you can expect the average wuxia to pass the Bechdel test with flying colors. It may not always pass all the other gender tests, but conversations (and deep friendships) between female characters are usually on-screen (not just implied), and often a strong part of the storyline.
7. The super-hero-like skills -- leaping from or to an extreme height, tossing someone a great distance, getting thrown far and getting up again -- are a good map to things like gunslingers who can shoot a playing card at eighty paces blindfolded. Or Robin Hood getting a bullseye through the arrows of someone else’s bullseyes. Wuxia tends to expect even superlative skills at a beginner’s level (so you’ll see student-characters doing such), but it’s all just ways to say, these characters have studied the sword while the rest of us were waiting for the translation team to release the next episode.
8. Those skills are not magic, which occupies a different category. Whether shown or implied, wuxia’s ‘martial arts’ (if exaggerated and unrealistic) are still studied. When magic shows up, it’s often derided, because it’s a shortcut. There’s an insincerity, a kind of bad sportsmanship. The reaction in-story is much like real world reaction to athletes using performance-enhancing drugs. It’s cheating, and it’s disrespectful towards your opponents, that you refused to match their efforts with equal effort of your own.
9. Every story has its own definition of what is, or is not, ‘magic’ and thus a shortcut. Wuxia is usually pretty good about making clear what the story considers ‘orthodox’ or ‘right’: look for characters introduced as authoritative voices in the story’s world, and what they do is probably a good indication of accepted skills (that is, not-magic). Well, unless the character cackles a lot, in which case they’re probably an example of magic/unorthodox approaches.
9. Qi -- energy -- is the root of a character’s power (or lack thereof). Plenty of wuxia only reference this concept in passing, but some codify it into a necessity -- as in, some people have the ‘right’ kind of qi, and some do not. Or that it takes years to develop so the hero is permanently behind until they finally get to doing the work. Whether nature or nuture, this qi is how a cultivator can leap high bounds while the background farmer or merchant characters must scramble to find a ladder.
10. Over the years of television, ‘manipulating qi’ -- shoving energy at someone through the hands/feet, a sword, a musical instrument, something else -- has developed its own set of stylized movements. It’s a lot of arm-waving and finger twirling and whatnot (often circular). I think of it like riding an invisible bike to charge the generator; releasing it means the TV has the juice to kick on. Or the tazer can release, or whatever.
11. There are a bunch of virtues being promoted by wuxia, from a tangle of daoism, buddhism, and confucianism -- things like loyalty, sincerity, honesty, humility, respecting one’s parents (or teacher), benevolence, and justice (or righteousness). Plus a disregard for wealth or glory for personal gain.
The good (or enduring) wuxia stories seem to be the ones that find a way to make a virtue into a point of conflict -- as in, loyalty to what/who, questions of what it means to be righteous in this circumstance or that, and so on. The virtue is still at the heart of things, the conflict lies in how it’s interpreted or applied.
12. Wuxia predates Confucianism and Buddhism (and possibly Daoism), so it’s got a long history of cherrypicking to mix and match as it pleases. Some things you might see, and the influencing source:
horsetail whisks, used for purifying a space and removing evil influences, traditionally carried by Daoist priests as a sign of their rank.
an emphasis on Yin and Yang as driving opposing energies (sometimes good and bad, sometimes required to be balanced), also a Daoist concept.
most mystical elements are also Daoist influence: like qigong (coordinated posture and movement to increase/improve health, spiritual strength, and martial prowess), alchemy, astrology, etc.
mudras (hand gestures, cf Naruto) are predominantly Buddhist, meant as a way to focus oneself. When these show up in wuxia, the origin is still ‘to focus oneself’ but being wuxia, the result is usually a burst of visible power.
if a story revolves around learning to forgive/forget and to have compassion (over vengeance), that’s the Buddhist influence showing.
if filial piety, the observance of rites, or questions of ethics/morality are significant themes, that’s probably confucianism’s influence.
The lines are way blurrier than I’m going into, here. After all, the three perspectives have competed and coexisted for hundreds of years. There’s a fair bit of cross-contamination, as it were.
13. A lot of wuxia -- and I mean a lot of wuxia -- can be boiled down to coming-of-age stories: a young hero faces trials and tribulations on his (or her) way to finding a place in society. Sometimes it’s working their way up through the levels to claim the top spot; sometimes it’s being rejected from the school they wanted, and continuing to fight that fate until they’re accepted and demonstrate they deserve to be there.
This focus on younger heroes also means that wuxia is rife with idol dramas, where the majority of the cast are young/first-time actors, chosen for their looks and their similarity to the character (so as to not require too much of a stretch for them, acting-wise). On the other hand, this does often mean the pretty is almost overwhelming, since it’s looks and not long-time acting experience that set the bar.
14. Compared to other Chinese literary genres, wuxia is somewhat unique in its emphasis on individualism, but this isn’t to say you should expect full-throated american-style rugged individualism. I’d say it’s less about the individual breaking free of social rules, and more that the individual must find a way to interpret those social rules and forge a compromise between what they’re required to be vs who they want to be.
The best illustration I can think of is a parental dictate of “I want you to marry and have a family,” that sets off the story’s conflict. By the end of the story, the now-adult child realizes the message wasn’t meant literally so much as a way to say, “I want you to grow up, have a place in this world, surrounded by people who love you.” The error wasn’t in the parents’ blindness to the child’s needs, but in the child’s interpretation of the parental message.
(Unlike historical or modern dramas, which often have a lot of daddy issues -- thanks, Confucius -- wuxia is relatively free of that. Child-parent conflict is common, but truly dysfunctional on the level of modern melodramas, not quite so much.)
15. The fights are balletic and acrobatic; they’re meant as an abstract representation of a fight. You want reality, go watch an HK or Korean action movie/show. Wuxia is where you go for the twirling, the leaps, the spins, all the kinds of moves that no decent fighter would ever do, ‘cause turning your back on the enemy gets you killed -- but wuxia isn’t about that, it’s about the cool visual factor.
16. Historically and aesthetically, the costumes are closest to the Ming dynasty -- layered and belted ankle-length robes with long, flowing sleeves. Partly because the Ming dynasty seems to be a favorite setting (for whatever quality of actual time period a story even bothers to identify), but also (at least, my theory is) because those big sleeves make for dramatic gestures when swinging a sword.
17. There are newer wuxia that show some Game of Thrones influence (or, in the movie adaptations like The Four, some grimdark-slash-steampunk influences) but for the most part, wuxia is rather brightly-lit. My theory is that it was traditionally designed to be visible on (literally) smaller TVs, out in rural villages and whatnot. Frex, the darkest things get in wuxia, visually, is a day-for-night blue, since filming at night for real makes for an awful dark screen.
This is changing -- I’ve seen a lot more wuxia that are genuinely filming at night -- but the same show may also do day-for-night just cause they’re on a tight schedule and can’t sit around until it’s dark again to shoot the next scene, so they make do.
18. Older filming styles still dominate in wuxia, and the one you may notice the most is a particular move where the speaking character turns away from whomever they’re talking to, walks towards the camera, and speaks in the direction of the camera. It’s just not something people normally do, but it happens all the time in wuxia.
I think it comes from the days of only having one camera, so either you took the time to reshoot to get reactions (not really possible on shoestring budgets with tight deadlines), or you made sure the frame could include the speaker and the listeners. (Or it might be coming from the stage, where the actor must face the audience to be heard.)
The basic blocking, lighting, and so on sometimes reminds me of afternoon soap operas from the 80s, done with videotape rather than film. Not cheap so much as lower budget.
19. If you want historical authenticity, this is the last place to look. The costumes will be flashy, especially for the hero and his love interest: layered and embroidered, with modern fabrics in bright, sometimes neon!, shades and combinations (Nicholas Tse, I see you).
Older wuxia, the characters rarely got dirty, a wound from a fight was represented by a streak of clearly-fake (and somewhat diluted) pink syrup, and plenty of times a character will go through an entire battle and not even be sweaty or dirty. (Game of Thrones is changing this, too, though -- I’m seeing more dishevelment, though it’s still relatively minor compared to post-battle LotR or GoT.)
20. You can tell the budget from two things: how many costumes and how many wigs. A lower-budget wuxia (or one made at rapid pace) means characters go to bed in their day-clothes, with headpieces still on. Wigs are expensive, and a quickly-made wuxia means you get one wig, and that’s what you’re always wearing, rather than a wig for sleeping and another for waking. Same goes for showing characters in their day-clothes versus what they’d wear for night, or when relaxing, or whatever. (Or having two versions of the same costume, one pre-battle and one post-battle.)
21. About that historical bit -- at least up to the Qing dynasty, Chinese men usually wore their hair in a top-knot once they reached adulthood. Wuxia’s aesthetic is for everyone -- including elderly men -- wearing their hair mostly down with only a small top-knot to pull back their bangs. This just isn’t how anyone wore their hair, but it’s a massive visual clue that the story takes place in the jianghu, where normal society’s rules don’t apply.
22. I think I mentioned the Ming dynasty -- not sure why, but it seems to be the most favorite target. (You’d think it’d be the Qing, since they were outsiders, but nope.) The literary precursors of wuxia had a strong streak of ‘the government is corrupt and/or full of idiots, we’re better off doing our own thing over here,’ which led to various dynasties cracking down on wuxia as a kind of rebel literature.
It’s kind of ironic that wuxia’s history of overturning the natural order confucian principles (that is, treating individualism as an equal virtue, and elevating commoners to hero-status for *gasp* leaving their place of birth to wander around and do good deeds) is what made wuxia immensely popular during the cultural revolution, when China was busy deconstructing (often violently) so much of its cultural past. Wuxia stood apart, as something that had been quietly deconstructing all along, and thus shot up in popularity for finally being in tune with the zeitgeist.
(Wuxia in all its forms has always, perhaps unsurprisingly, been massively popular among the common classes. Wuxia is not, never has been, a high literary form; watching wuxia means you’re watching the latest iteration of an ancient yet truly pop-as-in-popular-as-in-common culture.)
I get the impression the chinese authorities have an uneasier relationship with historical dramas (which can walk a fine line of implying that imperial past as a good/positive), whereas wuxia’s place in the mythical jianghu diminishes its ability to threaten via social commentary. This isn’t to say wuxia isn’t in dialogue with the social and political environment in which it’s made; all literature is, by virtue of being of its time. It’s just a bit more coy about it, and its loudest political-type trait -- of dismissing the imperial system/capital as corrupt, evil, or otherwise contemptible -- fits with a desire to see the dynastic past as something to be discarded and/or dismissed, not emulated.
23. Oh, and one last thing: wuxia is very, very, very chaste. A lot of the romantic relationships are almost entirely implied -- a lot of longing looks, maybe the exchange of a significant gift, I mean, we’re talking a genre that considers holding hands to be pretty daring. I’ve seen entire series where you know those two will end up together, but if you can’t read the visual cues, you’d think they were just close friends (if not socially-awkward acquaintances).
That said, when wuxia breaks that so-chaste rule, it’s like having a table dropped on you. There’s a drunken makeout scene in The Legends that had my jaw on the table because holy smokes, that was unexpected. Mad passionate wild abandonment just isn’t a thing in wuxia.
[ETA: don’t get me wrong, wuxia in general is hugely passionate. Just not on a sexual level; it’s on the emotional level that wuxia will go to eleven, repeatedly.]
...okay, that wasn’t even in the neighborhood of brief. hell, it wasn’t even in the same state as brief, but I did warn you. Wuxia’s a huge genre, after all. An entire book might still only scratch the surface, but hopefully this suffices as a general introduction.
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fandom positivity thoughts
I know I‘m just a quiet fangirl for myself, but there are some things need to be told now.
I‘m very deep in mxtx hell at the moment so most of my takes are about those brilliant novels as an example, but you can project it on every fandom in existence.
At first, this account was dedicated to post theories, ideas and meta stuff from the beginning and I want to be active again. But let me say, fandom is .. pretty tiring on some point. This post isn‘t a goodbye, on the contrary I want to be one of those who want to make everything more positive, more healthy for the supporters and so -
~
here are some advices how you can still make fandom to a very, very nice expierience:
- keep a healthy distance on the people you never interacted with
- deeply think about your heart, share what you love, your own takes what makes you feel comfortable
- just.. have fun! It‘s about that thing you love, so it‘s something you don‘t have to take to seriously
- separate fiction and reality!
- if someone says something bad or has a bad take, think that you (mostly) don‘t know that person. You can‘t judge. It‘s way better and healthier to mute and block them.
- if those things bothers you to much, then talk to that person directly, ask why they have those thoughts, it‘s way healthier than assuming.
- stay friendly in every discussion, we are all people, people from all over the world, individuals with personal experiences and backgrounds and most of us are here in fandom to have fun, to distract us from the issues in the real world. Think about that.
- Whatever you see, never forget – where the discourses are, there are always the peace. EVERY fandom has a nice and supportive side to!
~
Please don‘t feel pressured about it. Those are just my inner values to cope with fandom drama. Take it as an advice, I know most of you just want a more comfortable, safe and happier place here.
Why I wrote this?
As I said in the beginning, I‘m in mxtx or merely danmei hell currently and I really love it there. I love the novels, I love those characters and stories and I have so many danmei on my reading list. I‘m so amazed, so grateful.
But I have the feeling that in danmei fandom, some people get more and more aggressive, problematic, unhealthy. I know it‘s just a few, but it felt a bit.. uncomfy lately.
I want to tell y‘all how exactly I feel and I try to cope. I love and enjoy all the novels mxtx wrote, I currently read tgcf, but I entered book 5 and I really love it – so I think I can say they‘re all masterpieces for me.
mdzs, svsss and tgcf are all so so good, omg. I feel so hard for it. And I absolutely adore the main pairings wangxian, bingqiu and hualian. I, as some really sensitive person, can feel the deep love the characters have through it never was easy for them. But for me, they are so well written – feeling like real authentic people with the unconditional bond to their soulmate.
The stories itself are much more – quite dark, political and complex with so many twists; sometimes funny, sometimes just VERY emotional. Omg, I love it so much!
But I want to tell you more about my deep obsession with mxtx‘ novels in the future – because this blog is dedicated to mention something else.
So – like in every fandom in mxtx fandom, there are very mixed kind of people. People in their 30‘s, People with a better cultural background, People who just want to enjoy – like I said, individuals. So hear me out:
Mo Dao Zu Shi has several adaptations, as an example one of the most popular is the live action drama called ‚The Untamed‘.
And yes, it‘s clearly different from the novel – the censorship, some added story elements and so on. There are people who like the origin story, and there are people who feel more familiar with the live action – and that‘s totally fine. Some prefer the donghua and some other love the audio drama for another example – because we are individuals. Calm down, it‘s nothing bad on it‘s own.
I, for myself, love the novel the most because of the depth of the story, but also appreciate every adaptation. And that‘s ok. I accept every else opinion. If someone now has a bad take, says something bad about a pairing, a character – I accept it as their opinion and mute. If someone went aggressive, I don‘t even take it personal – just reporting, blocking and that‘s all. Because everyone has their own feelings.
And – just a personal advice – yes, there maybe even the antis here in mxtx fandom as well as in every fandom. Don‘t let them ruin your opinion, your feelings. They can post and share what they want, they CAN‘T change your opinion. They probably have a personal issue, a hard time in life or are very very bored – it‘s a personal thing, and has mostly nothing to do with mxtx, or the fandom itself. It goes for every fandom.
I really love my mutuals I made within the mxtx fandom – it gives me such a very happy time in difficult times like currently going on. And I just want to let you know that this post is in fact, dedicated to help you, to think about how to make our fandom better. With every love sharing, we can make everything a bit better. A bit healthier. And as long as we all stay friendly and accept the indiviual issues everyone have.
If we try to do the best for ourselfes and talk openly, we sure can bring more happiness here again.
I start with the positivity soon with the character analysis of my favs – I really want to tell you why I love them so much and why they have such a special place in my heart.
You‘re all welcome to join. ♥ For more love and positivity ♥
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