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mdzs-owns-my-ass-i-guess · 1 year

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No simping in the Cloud Recesses!!

I received permission to write a ficlet based off this amazing post by the lovely @lovewanxian and this is the result. They're working on their own fic on the same premise, so make sure to give them some love when they post it <3

I had a lot of fun writing this and drank a lot of water to quench the thirst. It didn't work, but I highly recommend hydration - and have fun!

Lan Sizhui is suffering.

Now before you get up in arms about who to kill, it's not that kind of suffering. Nobody's trying to kill him and Lan Jingyi's pranks have yet to land him in the infirmary - the suffering that's plaguing Lan Sizhui is spiritual.

No, it's not a qi deviation, although he is quite sure he's heading that way far too quickly for his age and skill level. And he didn't get cursed either - hm, well, that's debatable in the circumstances - but the point is, his suffering isn't caused by anything that's related to cultivation or any outside interference.

Lan Sizhui is suffering because all his friends are simping.

But that's normal teenage boy behavior, you might argue. Teenagehood is, virtually, the best age to simp, it's basically in the job description for the ages between 13 and 19.

Fair, but Lan Sizhui's friends are simping over Senior Wei, who is twice their age, married and one of Sizhui's beloved father figures. See the issue yet?

Imagine all your friends do all day is lament over how much they want your dad to "punish" them, how hot his ghostly cultivation is and how much they wish he'd turn them into fierce corpses - Sizhui suffering makes sense now, doesn't it?

And he's been through this before. His friends' first crush has largely been Hanguang-Jun. Understandable - Sizhui has eyes, and he can admit he's attractive, objectively speaking.

To Sizhui, he's been the closest thing to a parent for many years, so thinking of him as anything less is weird - but facts are facts. Hanguang-Jun is powerful, domineering, but kind and supportive. These are all attractive features.

Sizhui has long grown used to Jingyi fangirling over him, and to the self-insert fic black market he ran out of their room from ages 12 to 15. He's done handstands for days to atone for it, and has made peace with it.

Of course, all juniors have kept some degree of Hanguang-Jun worship and, as the female disciples put it, "fanny flutters", but the crushing has evolved into admiration rather than infatuation and Sizhui only has to deal with number one Hanguang-Jun stan fluttering over his dad.

And then Senior Wei came about and Sizhui's peace of mind has gone to hell.

Disclaimer for all of you clutching your pearls right now: Sizhui loves Senior Wei very much and is infinitely grateful to have him back, has even slipped and called him "baba" a few times. The problem doesn't lay with Senior Wei at all.

The problem lays with the entirety of the Lan junior population (please let it be just the juniors, if the seniors simp over Senior Wei too, Sizhui's going to defect) being shameless about a man that's treated them as nothing less than his unofficially adopted children.

And how do they show their gratitude? By lusting over him and moaning about how lucky Hanguang-Jun is to bed him every night.

Lan Sizhui is suffering.

---

Lan Wangji is suffering.

No, he isn't dying, cursed, qi deviating or having to sit through sect leader Yao's rants - he's being Wei Ying's teacher assistant for his introductory talisman course.

It may sound confusing - how could that be a cause for suffering? Lan Wangji loves his husband and being around him, finds his inventions fascinating and likes helping him. So what's the issue?

The issue is that literally nobody in that whole entire classroom is paying any attention to the lesson. Sword to their neck, he is positive neither of them would be able to recall not even the past five minutes of talisman theory.

But ask them anything about Wei Ying and they'd rant for hours. And Lan Wangji doubts it would be a respectful rant.

Because the Lan juniors may not be paying attention to talismans, but by God are they paying attention to their teacher. Lan Wangji can virtually see the hearts in their eyes and the bloodflow directing down south - and he hates it. Wei Ying is being such a thorough teacher, he's putting his heart and soul into it, but his class seems fascinated only with the robes he wears, the way he moves, and they nearly break their necks to look at him when he turns his back to write something on the blackboard.

(Okay, Lan Wangji does too, sue him, that's his husband, he's allowed.)

Point is, these kids are entirely undisciplined. Lusting after seniors is not explicitly forbidden in the rules, but Lan Wangji is going to suggest his uncle adds it to the list. This way, he can hand harsh punishments fairly. Nobody is allowed to have horny thoughts about his husband except for him.

And it's not like the kids are being subtle about it either.

Here's an exmple.

Wei Ying's just finished demonstrating the penmanship for a banishing talisman, and encouraged the students to try it themselves, as he would walk among them and offer help where needed.

Everyone - everyone except Sizhui and Jingyi - needed help. Even those that Lan Wangji knew to be specialized in talisman work.

Everyone needed Senior Wei to take their hand in his, lean closely and direct their brush strokes. Everyone needed to be spoken to softly and encouraged to try again.

Lan Wangji has broken two brushes already and he's probably going to move to breaking fingers next.

One of the students, Lan Yichen, Hanguang-Jun's third favorite after his two ducklings (yes, they're his favorites, no, nobody knows and this doesn't cloud his judgement, yes, they're his ducklings), raised his hand and called for "teacher Wei" (Lan Wangji glares his way, but of course the little horny bastard has no time to look anywhere but at Wei Ying).

"What's wrong?" Wei Ying very obliviously asks and Lan Wangji feels the wood of his third brush crack in his grip.

"I really don't know why this talisman won't burn correctly..." Lan Yichen whines, looking up at his senior through his lashes, pathetic and submissive.

Lan Wangji will have him copy the rules about propriety fourty times.

Wei Ying looks over his shoulder at his talisman, and doesn't see the way the boy leans into his scent just a little bit, his cheeks dusting red at the close contact.

Lan Wangji fights the urge to grip Bichen. He can't kill a kid. Come on.

Wei Ying takes the brush from his hand and glides it once over the talisman paper. He smiles encouragingly at Yichen, who's managed to make himself look borderline tearful. "Let's try it together now."

"T-Together?"

Lan Wangji is a strong man. Self-disciplined, in control. He doesn't know how much longer he'll be able to stop himself from - what was the word Jingyi used... ah yes - yeeting that young man all the way to his home sect.

"I'll send in some of my spiritual energy, and you send in the rest. Let's see if anything cool happens, yeah?"

The boy looks like he's won the lottery. Lan Wangji can see it behind the sopping wet cat look. The brush in his hand is halfway broken now.

The talisman lights up blue and dissipates.

"Wow!" Lan Yichen shouts, as if he hasn't been using talismans for the past 5-7 years of his cultivation career. "You're so good at this, teacher Wei!"

Wei Ying laughs and pats the boy's head before returning to his teaching desk. Behind him, the boy looks like he's just ascended. Or had an orgasm.

Either way, Lan Wangji breaks his brush in little smithereens and tries talking himself out of murder.

"These kids are so distracted today." Wei Ying sighs. "I knew I shouldn't have taken you with me, all they do is look at you."

It takes all Lan Wangji has not to side eye his husband.

---

Lan Sizhui walks into his room after having tea with his dads - they always have tea together before night hunts, a little ritual to lift their spirits and... well, for a last memory if something bad happens. It's a risk of the job, after all, though it's highly unlikely, considering how powerful both Hanguang-Jun and Senior Wei are.

So, Sizhui happily returns to his room to get ready and finds several of his friends all over the place, looking much like the backstage to a courtesan show. Some are struggling on deciding which robes to put on, others fight for natural light to powder their faces and the rest struggle with hairstyles.

"Hello, people who do not live here. Where's Jingyi?"

"Getting scolded for calling sect leader Nie cunty to his face at the last discussion conference." One of the boys, Lan Haoran, answers, blending the powder into his skin to hide acne scars. "He's not allowed to come to the night hunt with us."

"That's a compliment." Sizhui replies, and barely manages to reach his wardrobe for clothes in the mess.

"Tell that to teacher Lan Qiren."

"Anyway, what are you guys doing here?"

"Getting ready for the night hunt, duh!" Another, Lan Lixin, says, fixing a golden hairpiece in his bun.

"And since when does night hunting entail a makeover?"

"You want us to look like shit with Senior Wei around?!" Lan Tao exclaims, emerging from the bathroom in a delicately ornate set of light blue robes. "We have to look presentable."

Sizhui rolls his eyes. "You know he only has eyes for Hanguang-Jun."

"It's worth a try." Lan Lixin says, taking a final look in the mirror. "And anyway, last time he said he liked my hairpin, so what more could a man want from life?"

Sizhui takes in a deep breath to calm down. "And why are you lot here instead of your own rooms?"

"Your room has the best lighting." Lan Haoran responds. "God, I really need to invest in some skincare."

"Anyways, do you guys think we'll get to see Senior Wei control the Ghost General this time?" Lan Tao asks.

There are three dreamy sighs in response.

"I wish he'd control me like that. He wouldn't even need Chenqing, I'd just do anything he wanted stat."

"Same. I love when he gets all serious, I'd love him to get like that with me~"

"You guys realize I'm right here, right?"

---

Wei Ying saves his third Lan junior of the night and he's starting to grow tired. Of course, he doesn't expect them to be able to take on a night hunt independently and succeed at it, he's quite sure they've never been so uncoordinated before.

The strings of the guqin vibrate loudly and the fierce corpses kneel, growling in pain. Wei Ying rushes to pluck yet another child from their grasps and sends a burst of resentful energy their way. "It's alright, I got you."

The boy in his arms whines and hides further in Wei Ying's chest. He didn't get hurt that badly, but Wei Ying figures it must have been terrifying for him to be nearly torn into, so his reaction is understandable.

He gently lays the boy against a tree, wipes some dirt off his face and sends him a reassuring smile. "It's all right now, you're safe."

"Thank you, senior Wei..."

Lan Wangji rolls his eyes as his fingers move over the guqin. Who knew the Lan have so many aspiring actors in their ranks?

Wei Ying lifts Chenqing to his lips and a shrill tune fills the silence. The fierce corpses writhe at the sound, and, holding the flute with one hand, Wei Ying sends three talismans to immobilize them.

A nod is all it takes for Hanguang-Jun to send Bichen their way.

"Wow..." the "injured" juniors exclaim, eyes fixated on senior Wei, his eyes glowing red and expression determined.

Sizhui, who's unfortunately been delegated to tend to their wounds, fastens a bandage a bit too hard on one of his friends, pulling his attention away.

"You lot are being ridiculous. You could've gotten killed."

Lan Tao clutches his arm, eyes full of horny ideas as he stares at the way Senior Wei sends resentful tendrils towards the fierce corpses. "I wonder what else he can do with those."

"You know what, I'm going to kill you myself actually."

"What's your issue, Sizhui? It's not like it's our fault senior Wei is a DILF." Lan Lixin huffs.

"I do not want to know what that means."

"It means dad I'd like to fu-"

Lan Lixin finds his lips glued together. Hanguang-Jun sends him an icy look. "Stop talking. Conserve your energy."

"Serves you right." Sizhui mumbles. "I was wondering when Hanguang-Jun will do something about you horn dogs."

Lan Lixin glares meaningfully at him, but Sizhui pretends not to see it.

"You guys need to stop thirsting after my family. Hanguang-Jun, now Senior Wei, who's next, the Ghost General?"

The boys appear to actually be considering the possibility and Sizhui barely stops himself from liberally smacking the backs of their heads.

At least Hanguang-Jun and Senior Wei have slain all the fierce corpses, and the night hunt is over.

If he has to see his friends act so pathetic for attention again, Sizhui is going to just jump in horde of fierce corpses sword-less.

---

"Ahh, Lan Zhan, you were even more beastly than usual today!" Wei Ying whines as he takes his rightful place on his husband's chest. "I'm not complaining, of course, but what brought this on?"

Lan Wangji decides not to answer, placing a possessive arm around Wei Ying's waist underneath the covers. "Mine."

"Yours, always." Wei Ying leaves a soft kiss on Lan Zhan's neck. "Hey, did you set up the silencing talismans before we started? I don't remember anymore."

"...yes."

Wei Ying hums and burrows further into Lan Zhan's chest, pliant and sleepy. "Good, good, we would've probably kept the whole inn awake if you hadn't."

---

The juniors' dark eyebags the next morning and their refusal to look either of their seniors in the eyes is peculiar.

But who can understand the youth these days, really?

#mdzs #mo dao zu shi #wangxian #lsz #ljy #writing attempts #this was really fun to write #f in the chat for the lan juniors

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incarnadinedreams · 1 year

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There are a couple common claims about things MXTX has said in author's notes which I just wanted to make a little note-to-self with the exact context/source of because they keep coming up again and again. I find that between general translation issues and then further filtered through summaries and offhand comments and then repurposed for... uh let's just say spirited debate, they tend to be presented as much stronger or more emphatic or more serious statements than the impression I got when reading them in context (the translated versions, of course!).

'Morally perfect' comes from the postscripts (published by Exiled Rebels as chapter 113.5):

Both WWX and LWJ are highly ideal characters, so there wouldn't be too much dispute on their moral standing. They're perfect as the protagonists. Of course, I do like WWX a lot, but if I'm looking for a boyfriend, sorry, I'll only have LWJ please.

This is the same postscript where she talks about the difficulties of publishing on the timeline she did and how she was worried the structure of the novel would do badly in serialized/webnovel format, how Xue Yang was like a has-been internet idol in the comments section compared to the Jiang Cheng haters (lol), how she threw everything she liked about an ancient setting in a pot and changed whatever she liked without any intention of historical accuracy at all, etc. So the focus of the postscript wasn't like a morality essay or anything, just offhand comments and notes and trivia.

'MXTX wants us to be like Wangxian' comes from the final author's note of the last extra (ExR ch. 126):

Without care for anything at all, I shall give the entirety of my soul to the pen and the paper.

I no longer like to tell my readers, 'I love you.' These words are too light, and yet these words are too heavy.

I hope each of you who enjoys this book can be like Lan WangJi in virtue and Wei WuXian in character.

P.S. I received the help of many in the publication process.

There's more before and after, from talking about how she decided the type of story she wanted it to be, outlining process, and then after she goes on to thank her editors, the webnovel platform, supportive friends, etc.

Whether any given person cares what her opinion is out-of-text or not is another matter of course! But since it gets brought up so much as if they're very serious Word Of God proclamations... well... it's probably pretty obvious my opinion/interpretation lands in the 'it's not supposed to be that serious, bruh' category.

Though even if it were meant to be super serious I'd personally still be like, 'well that's just like, your opinion, random author lady.' But at the same time, these quotes tend to be used in a way that gives a distorted impression of how serious and thorough they were intended to be and often add confusion.

Also I don't think MXTX is saying we should go feed a guy's fingers to a ghost child in front of him while he's forced to eat his own leg but that's really just wild speculation and assumption on my part, maybe she would appreciate that idk.

#definitely inspired by @thatswhatsushesaid 's recent post because it made me track down where they were getting the second claim from #but the first floats around more often #obviously both of these quotes are from the ExR translations so you know #the translation may give a VERY different impression than the original which I cannot comment on #but I think most of the people bringing these up constantly are also basing it off these translations #and I disagree with their interpretations of what's presented #when someone pulls out the 'MXTX says x is moral!' my reaction is something like 'so if MXTX told you to jump off a bridge would you do it?#that's my boomer soul leaking out though

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letteredlettered · 10 months

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I'm conflicted about whether to encourage you to read the MDZS novel or not. On the one hand, it's revolutionary for danmei in many ways (to the hatred and love of many), and reading it would be akin to reading Jin Yong one day. On the other hand, if you love Wei Wuxian and find some actions in the show "unforgivable," you will be severely disappointed with him. For the sake of censorship, many of the "crimes/sins" he committed were passed onto Jin Guangyao so that the idea of "good" and "evil" are more clearly distinguished. In recent years, China has even censored some of its most popular works like Empresses in the Palace, Story of Yanxi Palace, for having heroines that were too morally grey. And of course, there were some actions too heinous to even be passed onto another character. Plus, consent is a little grey in the novel, and first times were simultaneously great and awful, prompting a sudden confession in dramatic areas.

But, I think even a bit more laden with the evils of this world... I still really loved Wei Wuxian of the novel. He tried. And failed. And maybe made things a lot worse. But as Lan Wangji said, his heart was in the right place. And... I think you'll feel a lot more for the Wen in the novel. They-- just the idea of continuous sacrifice and gratitude. I cried so much for them.

Sorry, you might regret it a bit, but I think it'll also make you feel fulfilled to read the novel.

Anyway, I hope your day is going well!

I'm already reading it! So you don't have to feel conflicted about whether to recommend it. :)

I don't think that liking it or not liking it will affect my interest in CQL or the fandom. I've been in many fandoms with multiple versions of canon; I find it's best to pick the versions that work for me and stick to them. Sometimes it can be frustrating when you love one version and hate the other version and it feels like everyone is disparaging the one you think is good in favor of the one that gives you moral hives, but I haven't really seen those kinds of comparisons going around, and this isn't Star Trek, so I'll probably be fine.

I'm a little flummoxed by this word "unforgivable." First of all, I find most things forgivable; I'm a forgiving person. Second of all, these are fictional characters; if someone does something unforgivable it doesn't make them uninteresting or unrelatable.

I don't dislike JGY because he does bad things. I am uninterested in JGY because his personality is boring to me and not something I find relatable.

I'm also a little flummoxed by the idea of not liking something because it is morally gray. I know I stomp around on tumblr.com a lot yelling about morality, but my basic moral philosophy boils down to "try your very best to cause no harm," which is something that is extremely gray, because there are no absolutes. There is no good and evil. There is only the effort to be kind and help each other, and it is shocking how fuzzy and unclear that can be.

I have hesitated to read the novels partly because I'm aware of the consent issues. I think it is important to have fiction that has non-con, including fiction that has very sexy unproblematized non-con that allows people to indulge in fantasies that would be unsafe and harmful in the real world. That said, I don't like it. At all. Not for moral reasons but because I find it singularly unsexy.

I'll conclude by saying that it's very true that I tend not to be drawn to villains as characters. It's less because I find them morally repugnant, and more because they are often uninteresting to me. I think possibly the thing that draws me to a character the most is effort, especially an effort to do and be good--but this is a personal preference, not a moral one. I identify with characters who try to be good, and this makes me like them. I enjoy them the most when they fail a lot while trying their absolutely little best. Personally, I've heard mixed reviews about WWX in MDZS canon; some report, as you do, that he tries a lot and fails; others report that he's pretty careless in ways that make me feel a lot less interested in him. Since I'm already reading it, I'll find out, but the main thing I've taken away so far is that these novels are hilarious. I can't believe how funny it is. What a delight.

#mzds #wei wuxian #morality

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lazulisong · 1 year

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aight

@hystericblue wanted wei wuxian and @inkstainedarm wanted mdzs in general so :D

this is actually kind of about Nie Huisang too but cut for spoilers

its fascinating to look at wei wuxian's characterization and realize one of the major themes is how he, as one of the, if not THE smartest person in the room, looks at cultivation society and their beliefs and basically goes "yeah nah i'm out" -- not giving up his powers or his family, but simply refusing to play a game he's well aware that he has no chance of winning. (Lan Wangji figured this out well before him, which is why he spent thirteen years steadily refusing to do anything but what his conscience told him. in Wei Wuxian's defense, he spent most of that time dead.) so he refuses to be a hero or a villain any more, refuses to be the scapegoat that he's been molded to be since he came to the Jiangs.

(as an aside im actually real curious about what word they actually use when people call WWX 'the son of a servant', because China has a long history of slavery and bondservanthood, so is it just like, a class thing? or was his dad an actual slave or bondsman? was he a freedman? so many questions.

i believe that, like in most slave-holding cultures, you could be born with the status of a slave and i have a vague idea that if one parent was free or a freedsman the child could inherit freedom from them, but it's very possible i'm mixing up my cultures. the romans, man. [i have the vague impression that in imperial rome, a child born to an enslaved woman is also born enslaved, but a child born to a free woman inherits her free status because, uh, slaves couldn't legally hold property without permission. and women and children were. very much. property.] [depending on the era because roman history, by the narrowest definition, tends to be um. a bit of a sprawl] either way, its definitely a class issue and WWX does appear to be freeborn. anyway!)

but its still impossible for him to ignore suffering, or what he considers wrongdoing. WWX has an instinct to help people that somehow survived everything that happened to him.

and whats interesting about that particular bit of WWX's character -- the willingness to walk away, learned at such a high price, but also the willingness to seek justice -- is what Nie Huisang is betting his entire plan on. NHS bets that WWX would refuse to take power, or revenge, but that his inherent decency would make him see this puzzle through. that once again, WWX would follow his instinct to help, and also that even when WWX figures things out, he's going to understand what NHS had to do. im not saying that WWX approves of it, by any means or stretch of the imagination, but he understands it.

and he's right! he bases his entire delicate Jenga tower of a plot on his knowledge of WWX and he wins the whole god damn game. and im willing to bet that he and WWX are the only two that know it.

tl;dr wei wuxian and lan wangji are my babies but nie huisang is the one i would never, ever cross lmao

#meg what is your problem #fanfic #mdzs #u give me ko-fi i give u nonsense #for eight dollars i will Stop

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iwillthrowbricksatyou · 27 days

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FMK Nie Huaisang Nie Mingjue & Lan Qiren ^_^

Aweeeeeee NAH bruh this is too difficult

Again, treating them as real for this purpose.

Lan Qiren -- Marry. He's just too hot to pass up. He has a 2/2 track record of raising children that I approve of. He may have his reservations about some things but I think both Jades are good. If I have his kid, I'll back him up on his Lan values. Again, I kinda went to meditation school and while I was a demon back then and there and I terrorized the teachers, at least I'm familiar with the lifestyle and I agree that it's a fair enough way to live. Like what. The values are like "respect your elders", "don't gossip", blah blah blah. It's mainly to train the youth to self control. They're not asking you to sacrifice 1 litre of blood to open a gate to hell. Their punishment standards are acceptable. I think I have a solid idea how to do whatever I want and minimize the amount of punishment, I think I know why wangji got the punishment he did and I think I know how to avoid something that brutal. But also I have no desire to drink or go fight someone or pull a wangji for a wei ying. Ok so like think about this. Not all Lans follow all the rules. Realistically you can expect the most disciplined average guy to follow about 50%. And God knows how many damn rules they have. You don't see the average Lan getting eviscerated for their shortcomings. I fuck with that. If I take a guess (not backed up by canon), I'd say the purpose of these rules is to just remind you how you should be. I doubt anyone expects you to be exactly that. It's probably so you realize "ah shit I gossiped. that's a bad thing". You know like the deal with religion? The reason my cousin doesn't eat beef despite his household God not being the same he grew up with is because he still has that lingering "but thats mother". You know what I mean? I don't think I can explain it.

The food might be an issue tho because I really cannot stand anything that isn't spicy enough to set you on fire. And chilis grow in hot and humid areas which is definitely not the cloud recesses. I can't even plant them. You win some you lose some. I'll cry every day. Lotus Pier save me.

Nie Mingjue -- Fuck. Bruh. 0/1 track record. No bruh. And exact same reasons as the one I said for the previous.

Nie HuaisaKill. If I get stuck with post canon NHS, I will assume him to still be like he was as a teen because he's too good of an actor. And boy did I HATE the person he was as a teen. If he was real. He was extremely cute and endearing otherwise. For how much I shit on him, I need to clarify I actually do love him. Please believe me. I draw him the most.

#i feel like lqr feels the same way about wwx that I do about nhs #some words

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aranarumei · 3 months

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hi kiri I intend to make you type so many words. for our ask game I’m starting with xicheng because I have my share of opinions

ask me about a ship and I'll give my opinions + classify them as does / doesn't make sense, does / doesn't compel me oh boy. my askbox has never been this full you guys…! really fun all of you tho. some I’ve got thoughts on some I haven’t really considered etc. and very impressively: no dupes!

also. words have been written. to the point that I’m putting this under a readmore lmao. up top apology for the incoherence i do just ramble

sooo xicheng. until recently I did not know the ao3 stats for this ship were. that big? don't feel like dangling the classification like bait so I'll start by saying: doesn’t make sense, doesn't compel me. now I will take way too many words to explain exactly why I feel that way!

as a person I am first and foremost a jiang cheng x happiness shipper. kind of. I never want it to be easy for him. because I’m kind of a bastard. so I've actually read a bit of fic with jc in a few different ships, some of which have been xicheng. and there's like, a few of those fics that have portrayed as aspect of jiang cheng like... so sensitively and in a way that made me Feel Things. so I'll always love them for that. my issue is that I just feel like... in the case of these, lan xichen could often be anyone for me. i read mdzs like... pre-untamed, and lan xichen's like... idk. I liked his role in the story but he didn't super compel me? so some of my issues with xicheng stem from the fact that I've simply never thought about lan xichen that much, and I'm not really invested in exploring his character. I think they could have some compelling things because they have a variety of things on their ends that don't get fully resolved, by pure virtue of 1) existing in mdzs 2) being side characters. also if jiang cheng's visiting gusu lan it puts him in proximity of wei wuxian which does promise for interesting interactions. what sours me on xicheng is... like I've said, I think some fics can make it work enough for me. but I feel like a large motivator of the fic is just... "oh look, wei wuxian's got a brother, and so does lan wangji! let's ship them!" even though they're totally different people? and as a consequence these two tend to get sanded down into often reductive portrayals. lot of pair the spares energy.

also kind of on the subject... I think I just don't really like.... ships with jiang cheng? in general? well my tolerance actually varies but I think especially when they take place post-canon (which the xicheng I've read often does) it doesn't sit right with me. I think it’s because jiang cheng’s not in… dire straits post-canon, but he’s not really happy. like he got told about the golden core thing but he’s unable to say the thing back about why he ran off like that in the first place. and I don’t like post-canon ships where it’s like. oh… jiang cheng, you poor thing. you shall be fixed by love. so I think I’m softer on ships that deal with things that happen before everything goes to shit for this reason. like I’ve not watched a lot of the show, but him and wen qing could be fun especially since that makes the golden core thing way more fucked up. with sangcheng they were like. friends in canon and stuff and then it seems they’ve gotten more distant. with zhancheng I mean like. there’s that tension and those years where wei wuxian wasn’t around and they were carrying their separate griefs. but with xicheng I feel like they don’t have anything super interesting in canon, which makes their outsized popularity a bit startling to me.

this is like. deeply personal and is kind of petty but. as someone who has wandered into the jiang cheng tags a couple times. man. people really hate that guy. and also hate people who like him. at least the couple times I looked there was just a lot of stuff arguing about like. oh jiang cheng sucks actually he’s the worst and all his fans are delusional for liking him and they’re ignoring his Crimes. he’s a uniquely selfish character who is unable to express or feel love. I’m not saying this is everyone, it’s just… the vibe I got from quite a few posts. this was also years ago. maybe things are calmer. I’m definitely biased because jiang cheng has always been my favorite character, so of course I love him. but this isn’t a defense post of him. either you like him or you don’t. just don’t bother me. anyways, the thing about “love” has always stuck with me, because I think that jiang cheng so obviously expresses love. like… the entire way he feels about wei wuxian! that’s his brother! idk. if you can’t see that you’ve lost me. now do I think jiang cheng communicates any of his feelings well ever No.

but about the love thing. when I read romantic fics involving jiang cheng post-canon, intentionally or not, a lot of what I read had this angle of almost like… look how capable of love jiang cheng is. and I’m like. well jiang cheng already loves people. it may not have gone perfectly or been so beautiful but that doesn’t make it non-existent. if he loves selfishly or awkwardly or without communicating it, it doesn’t mean that the love doesn’t exist. I think I’m stumbling into incoherence here… but my favorite headcanon for jiang cheng is probably one where he’s aromantic and asexual, because to me it affirms this feeling of like. romantic love is not some kind of absolution. and the “love” that he feels isn’t any lesser than whatever romance is going around. many different ways to be aroace ofc but this is how I see it for him. a lot of this is probably also influenced by the fact that I’m writing a fic with aroace jiang cheng at this present moment haha. as you might imagine, having this headcanon means that I tend to be neutral on most jiang cheng ships! I think to really grab me you’d have to make it interesting on the other end, so the character’s not just a sounding board for jiang cheng’s issues and vice versa, which sort of sums up my problems with xicheng. even the xicheng fics I read and liked were like… great, I’m glad you’re treating these two like real characters and not wangxian to the left. however a lot of this fic is just like. wow jiang cheng / lan xichen you’ve had it hard. Here’s a character who will comfort you and support you. and that’s nice in a way, but not compelling as a ship, yknow? so that’s the sum up of my thoughts. I’m on the scale of neutral-dislike, but if there’s a particularly good portrayal of jiang cheng I’d probably read it.

#sunluvclub #ask #ask game #kiri.txt #in this essay I will

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burningdarkfire · 5 months

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10 characters/10 fandoms/10 tags

tagged by the lovely @aevallare, thank you!! 🫶

i overthought the "10 fandoms" to a painful degree because surely we all understand that a fandom does not simply mean "a piece of media" and thus the random YA book i read when i was like 12 doesn't count even though it probably does have one of my fave characters ever. but also it's a silly tag game so i can do whatever i want. anyway

caleb widogast (critical role) - YOU WERE NOT BORN WITH VENOM IN YOUR VEINS. YOU LEARNED IT! YOU LEARNED IT!!!!! what if a fictional character taught me how to let go of the guilt i've been carrying around since i was a teenager. and he likes cats and books. and he has unmatched hubris and beautiful long hair

lan wangji (the untamed) - how did you already know your heart at 16, lan wangji? how did you know? what is it like to have such incredible conviction in your own righteousness, such immeasurable devotion to your love, that the only regret you will ever have is not making the decision sooner as the years tick by and you are without him?

leona (league of legends) - we're just going to ignore the 2248402 retcons and go for the vibes of a sun knight who believes so fervently that she is an embodiment of her faith and yet it loses her the person she cares most about in the world. devotion that turns into ash in your mouth babyyyy

hanzo (overwatch) - literally just this text post it makes me howl with laughter every time. it's giving redemption but while still being the worst person ever the entire time. vibes

fabian seacaster (d20) - the way that everything about him is about his father except that he's not his father. the way he kills his father. the way he keeps his father's legacy. i love a character a) who is meticulously crafted in the shadow of someone else and b) who, despite everything, desperately wants to live!!

tom wambsgans (succession) - the pathetic man representation of the group. toxic wifeguy but he's actually the wife except he's not the wife at all because he's a man. guy who knows how to simper and shake ass and still punches down at every opportunity. king

mizu (blue eye samurai) - revenge quest. gender fuckery. unlimited toxic threesome potential. a sense of self that is warped beyond comprehension by the world around her AND a never give up attitude. she can literally do it all

tony stark (mcu) - redemption arc except he takes great power = great responsibility so seriously that he makes it the entire world's problem and also it kills him. incalculable hubris, horrendous attitude, infinite daddy issues, etc.

kylo ren (star wars) - you kind of have to pick and choose with this one but i choose the guy who thought his uncle was going to kill him and, again, proceeded to make his problems the entire galaxy's problems. desperate attempt to escape the legacy he inherited, fucked up sense of self, too many ego problems to count, do we see the pattern yet. etc.

cersei lannister (asoiaf) - unfortunately tywin lannister's trueborn son and heir was born a girl and proceeded to make that everybody else's problem. we get it by this point right

also here are some recent book-ish runner ups because i'm incapable of not recommending these books if the opportunity arises: yskandr (a memory called empire), general ouyang (she who became the sun), breq (imperial radch), and baru cormorant (the masquerade) 😎✌

i'll tag @callingvoicemail @capitola @road-rhythm @saturdaysky @eskelent @pairofsunflowers @nocttvrnes @tangereendream @perpetualnovelboyfriend @princesskuragina if any of y'all want!

#my posts #replies

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aitchnkay · 10 months

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A Phoenix Reborn Chapter 34

June, 2021 continued

Wandering through the forest at the base of Dafan Mountain, Lan WangJi kept his face expressionless even as he fumed. There were so many spirit attraction nets in the Jin gold surrounding the place; it would be nearly impossible for cultivators of any other sects to capture and kill prey. Having so many nets wasn’t against any rules of an informal night hunt like this; it was more of a show of affluence and power and intimidation than an actual attempt at capturing prey. Thankfully, he had enough of his own influence, power, and intimidation to cower even the Jin sect leadership; Bichen flew through the trees severing net after net.

Behind him, the junior Lan disciples chittered like chipmunks regurgitating what they had heard. Technically, they were spreading rumors; Lan WangJi decided to ignore this infraction as they weren’t embellishing what they heard: Jin RuLan was leading his first night hunt, loosely supervised by his maternal uncle, Jiang WanYin. At only thirteen, Jin RuLan was too young by Lan standards to be unsupervised in a night hunt, never mind leading one even with an uncle in the vicinity should anything go wrong. At only thirteen, he was too young to be referred to by his courtesy name, too. By all accounts, the young cultivator was brash, impulsive and socially repulsive. It would be easy to blame this on his orphan status; his own relatives certainly did so. The young Jin’s problems were more likely caused by being raised by two men with widely differing opinions on how to raise a child. Jin GuangYao was too soft, too dismissive of his nephew’s issues. Jiang WanYin acted towards the boy the way he acted towards anyone he was supposed to care about: with wild moods swinging between being harsh and uncaring to harsh and overly protective.

If Lan WangJi allowed himself to hate anyone, it would be Jiang WanYin. If there was an unwritten rule that should be followed it was: do not (try to) kill your Sect brother when he has committed no crimes.

Speaking of the devil…. Through the trees, Lan WangJi could see his nemesis stomp-striding towards something, a gaggle of senior Jiang disciples behind him. Ahead of him was a bundle of gold and white lying on the ground, probably Jin RuLan. And a figure in black. “It’s Senior Mo!” SiZhui exclaimed happily. Lan WangJi held up a hand for silence.

Senior Mo… the formerly blurry figure in dingy white or gray was neatly dressed in black now. He even had a red ribbon holding his hair up. Lan WangJi’s heart stuttered, his breath failed him. At this distance, it wasn’t a stranger, Mo XuanYu, standing there; it was him : Wei WuXian. Even the flinch when Jiang WanYin berated him looked the same. The paperman talisman rising from the Jin boy’s back was his .

How?

How could this Mo person look so much like Wei WuXian? Act so much like Wei Ying? There were plenty who wore the YiLing Patriarch’s black and red; none of those imitators wore it like this…. Like it was as necessary and a part of them as breathing. Looking at this scene… hurt. His chest felt constricted; it was hard to breathe.

It could have been them had the past been different. Wei Ying would certainly have used those papermen to control his out of control nephew while Jiang WanYin glowered at them both.

It wasn’t Wei Ying cowering from Jiang WanYin’s blustering, though.

Someone else stood in his place.

Lan WangJi had no desire to interfere in the conflict between this threesome. It wasn’t as if he didn’t already know how the conversation would go. The Jiang Sect leader would be making a half-empty threat about breaking their legs, and would definitely be threatening to use Zidian on Master Mo for emulating his former ShiXiong. Jin RuLan would be running his mouth, mostly with a ‘do you know how important I am’ attitude. Occasionally, Lan WangJi wanted to tell the boy that if you have to remind someone that you’re important, you’re obviously not. The only unknown was how Master Mo would react. That uncertainty was shortly cleared up: Master Mo started walking away.

All of a sudden, the Jin boy cowardly attacked Master Mo. Cowardly because not only was Master Mo unarmed, his back was turned to the boy. Lan WangJi hesitated half of a breath to see if the Sect leader would stop the unwarranted attack; his hands stayed at his side. Rather than see a madman skewered in the back by an unhinged child, Lan WangJi unsheathed Bichen and used its sword glare to deflect the blade. That was sufficient to inform Master Mo of the attempted murder; Lan WangJi watched the other man not allow his shock to prevent him from skittering to the relative safety of a large tree.

He even skitters like Wei Ying.

Lan WangJi resumed walking towards the uncle and nephew; hopefully Master Mo was sane enough to take advantage of the interruption to flee for his life. Unfortunately, even when he was only a few meters from the mannerless duo, he could see black skirts fluttering around the base of the tree. Leave , he ordered the man silently. I’m giving you a way out of this mess. Jiang WanYin was spouting some nonsense; Lan WangJi paid no attention to it. The conversation remained the same every time they encountered each other over the last thirteen years. By this point, Lan WangJi could recite the speech in full… assuming he ever felt the inclination to speak so many words. It was like listening to one of Nie HuaiSang’s funny birds from the south that knew how to speak a few phrases... only nowhere near as amazing. Boring .

Lan SiZhui tried to change the subject to discuss the overuse of the nets. Lan WangJi thought about stopping his son. ‘Fair’ meant nothing in a casual night hunt like this. The only ‘rules’ were the courtesy of not stealing prey from another sect. Unfortunately, his son’s pleas only infuriated the future Jin Sect leader; he flounced over to Lan WangJi with the quarrelsome arrogance of someone who had never been properly disciplined in his life. Lan WangJi waited, again in vain, for Jiang WanYin to step up and make his nephew behave. Enough , he decided, and with a quick glance, threw a Silencing spell over the boy.

Lan WangJi allowed himself a moment or two to feel childishly giddy and petty about disciplining the boy. It felt good . He wondered if Mo XuanYu knew about the Lan Silencing spells. And whether or not he felt it a somewhat appropriate punishment for a failed attempt at skewering the man.

Wei WuXian, of course, had been Silenced multiple times a week (sometimes multiple times a day) during his stay in Cloud Recesses. He would probably be laughing so hard right now to see his pretentious nephew so constrained. Unfortunately, this spell also had Jiang WanYin yelling again. Lan WangJi arose from his introspection to hear his enemy demand, “Lift it now!”

No. The Lan disciples behind him couldn’t lift the spell even if they wanted to. Or dared to. Even Lan XiChen had difficulty lifting Lan WangJi’s spell. Lan SiZhui explained the spell to the man in purple as if that man had never heard of it before. Lan WangJi didn’t think the Sect leader had ever been Silenced; however, he had been with Wei WuXian on many of the times that one had been Silenced. Then again, while the instruction was directed at the elder, perhaps the message was intended for the younger.

Wei Ying wouldn’t have allowed his nephew to grow this wild and unruly. He would have said there is a place for antics and for acting up against the Rules. Maybe, no definitely, they would have broken some rules together. He would also have made sure the boy grew up to respect his elders. And knew exactly when the time and place was for behaving or misbehaving.

Wei Ying had respected his elders until they showed they were no longer worthy of respect. Then they tried to kill him for it. Lan WangJi stifled the anger and hatred he still felt for that mob in the Nightless City. Every single one of them deserved to die for what they did that night. They saw that the Wen remnants were not cultivators or soldiers. They knew Wen Qing was no threat.They knew Wen QiongLin was the tool used to murder Jin ZiXuan, not the one actively murdering the Jin heir. Even knowing this, the Wens were still executed.

The unknown answer from that week was still: what were the Jin cultivators doing at Qiongqi Path that day? There was no work being done. There was no reason for such a huge contingent of cultivators to be there. Jin GuangShan never felt the need to defend their presence. The survivors were never asked to explain their presence.

Unless they were there with the sole purpose of killing Wei WuXian? And Jin ZiXuan’s death was an unfortunate side effect?

Or perhaps an intentional side effect to make way for Jin GuangYao to become heir? That ever present smile that never traveled past his lips rarely allowed that man’s true feelings to be seen. But Brother trusted him and Lan XiChen’s character judgement was considered excellent….

A Jiang disciple ran up to confess that all of the spirit attracting nets had been cut down. Lan WangJi watched as the Jiang Sect leader struggled to control his anger. Yes, the nets were expensive. Yes, the Jin Sect could well afford their loss. Yes, the Lan Sect could afford to replace them if the Jin threw a fit. Perhaps even the Jiang Sect was now rich enough to absorb the financial hit and not worry. Jiang WanYin would not be angry, really, about the costs. He would be furious at the disrespect.

Although, if it wasn’t against the unwritten rules of a casual night hunt to install so many nets, surely it wasn’t against those same unwritten rules to cut the empty ones all down? Lan WangJi allowed himself to remember another night hunt and another discussion about unwritten rules for a night hunt. It hadn’t been Jiang WanYin upset that day…. It also hadn’t been Jiang WanYin defending his brother that day.

When had it ever been Jiang WanYin defending Wei Ying? It was always the other way around. Always Wei Ying protecting his siblings…. Always Wei Ying sacrificing himself for them, pushing his needs and wants aside for them. I despise you , Lan WangJi allowed himself to think at Jiang WanYin as the younger man’s hand clenched and unclenched around Zidian’s ring. At least there were no purple flashes; it appeared the Sect leader was able to control himself enough for that, at least….

Jiang WanYin might be uncouth enough to want to fight a relatively unknown cultivator such as Mo XuanYu. He might be angry enough to permit his nephew to stab that same relatively unknown cultivator as punishment for using one of the YiLing Patriarch’s paperman talismans. He was not stupid enough to fight Lan WangJi. Not alone where only the two of them would know about it. And certainly not in front of all of these disciples.

Jiang WanYin didn’t like to lose. Anything. Anyone. At anything.

Except for his temper. He certainly didn’t mind losing his temper on a regular basis.

Lan WangJi realized he’d lost track of the conversation again when Jiang WanYin turned and stalked off. Good . “Go back to your positions,” he instructed the juniors. “Try your best, but don’t take risks.” A soul eating monster might be slightly out of their capabilities. He turned back to look at where Mo XuanYu had been hiding; the madman was still there, half hidden by the tree. And just as jumpy as Wei Ying had been when he was trying to hide an indiscretion. If he was scared enough of HanGuang-Jun back at Mo Manor to run away, what gave him the courage to stay pressed against the tree now?

Facing away from the masked madman, facing away from the man who imitated Wei Ying so perfectly, Lan WangJi couldn’t stop the pain rising again and again from his stomach into his chest. Wei Ying! His soul cried out its anguish for its mate. Over and over, the pain of loss and want and need wracked through his body as it had for the past thirteen years. His face stayed expressionless as it nearly always did. No one needed to know exactly how much he missed his soulmate. No one needed to know how much he wanted his love to return.

No one needed to know how much this madman's nearly perfect emulation made the hurt feel even worse.

Lan WangJi strode off in the same direction as Jiang WanYin. Away from the madman. Away from painful reminders.

The roadside food stall had only two tables under its awning. Unfortunately, the Jiang Sect leader had already occupied one. Lan WangJi sat and ordered a bowl, determinedly not looking at the other man. Not that Jiang WanYin wanted to look at the Lan disciple, either; he stared at the proprietor, frowning, body rigid. Most likely he was silently talking to himself, silently berating HanGuang-Jun. Or cursing the dead Wei WuXian.

Silently because orally berating the older man never resulted in a satisfactory response. Lan WangJi had over thirty years of experience in not responding to people he didn’t want to respond to. And thirteen of not listening to one foul mouthed man in purple.

Through the trees came the haunting sounds of a flute, badly played, and out of tune. Lan WangJi mentally winced alongside a spurt of annoyance at the pretend Wei disciples who insisted upon playing that wretched instrument without receiving proper training. Or even the most basic of training. Or using a decent instrument. He hadn’t seen any of them, other than Mo XuanYu, so far on this night hunt. That meant nothing; this forest and mountain was large enough that several hundred could wander around and he’d never run into them.

Thankfully, the crude music stopped. But only for a few moments. It resumed, just as poorly as before, before morphing into….

WangXian .

His song.

Their song.

A song that no one else in the whole world had ever heard. Not even A’Yuan had…. Only him. Only them. And only the once, so long ago, in a cave where they thought they were going to die. Wei Ying, shivering with fever and hunger, had begged for a song. And Lan Zhan, unable to deny him one simple request before death, had sung WangXian for him.

Lan WangJi’s heart soared higher than the highest clouds. He’s back. He’s back. My Wei Ying is alive! He quickly threw down a silver piece, overpaying for a meal he had yet to receive, and ran off. Yes, ran, until he reached a spot where he could ride his sword. He could hear Jiang WanYin fumbling behind him as he flew away from the eatery, the other’s shouts as to “what the fuck is going on?” left unanswered.

Every beat of his heart sang two notes: Wei Ying Wei Ying Wei Ying Wei Ying Wei Ying Wei Ying Wei Ying Wei Ying Wei Ying Wei Ying Wei Ying Wei Ying.

Landing on the temple road Lan WangJi quickly took in the situation. There was a group of cultivators, swords ready and pointed at one of two men. Wen QiongLin, somehow revived after supposedly being burned to death, wearing rags and wrapped in chains, haltingly walking towards… Mo XuanYu.

Except it wasn’t Mo XuanYu standing there, was it? Somehow it was Wei Ying. Wei WuXian was playing WangXian on a homemade bamboo flute, calling the Ghost General away from the cultivators.

Lan WangJi walked as quickly as he dared to the man he loved. He reached out, hand almost acting on its own, to clutch at Wei WuXian’s wrist. His heart beat faster upon feeling the warmth emanating from the cloth: WeiYing WeiYing WeiYing WeiYing WeiYing WeiYing WeiYing WeiYing WeiYing WeiYing WeiYing. Not a ghost. Not restored like Wen QiongLin. He’s real. And alive. Wei WuXian stilled under the light pressure, flute lowering slightly as he turned to see who was holding him.

Time slowed… stopped. Those eyes, that mouth…. Even partially hidden behind a mask, it was plainly obvious that this face was Wei WuXian’s. Not Mo XuanYu. How… why did I not consider… of course you survived. Somehow. But why ‘become’ Mo XuanYu? Lan WangJi’s thoughts tripped over each other trying to be heard over his heartbeats. Why did you run from me? Why didn’t you come find me once the furor was over? When did you become him?

That was a question to be answered much later. Now was the time to bask in the sunlight that was Wei Ying. A minute? An hour? A hundred years? However long it was, time passed and then Wei WuXian looked away, almost shyly, before lifting the flute once again to his lips. One last instruction, Lan WangJi supposed, as Wen QiongLin jumped high and far to flee from the mass of cultivators. And then, a miracle occurred: Wei WuXian grabbed hold of Lan WangJi’s wrist, hand clasping bare skin. The slight touch set Lan WangJi’s heart beating even faster in love and want and need and hope. WeiYingWeiYing WeiYingWeiYing WeiYingWeiYing WeiYingWeiYing WeiYingWeiYing.

Once he calmed down a bit, Lan WangJi supposed the casual grab was simply to prevent him from following after the Ghost General. Of course, Wei WiXian would want to protect his friend. Wei Ying’s face, his eyes, fleetingly shifted from one emotion to another: pleading for his friend, shyness, happiness, embarrassment. And was it there or did he imagine he saw affection and a lingering sadness. Lan WangJi’s face wasn’t expressionless, either. He could feel it feeling uncomfortably out of place. Maybe his own expression showed his feelings of relief and happiness and love and hope and trust? I missed you! I love you. Do you love me? Stay with me…. Let me stay with you. Please. Stay. I need you so much. Don’t ever leave me again. Please. Let me take care of you the way I failed to thirteen years ago. I promise I’ll stay respectful and never force you to accept my love. Just please….. Please…. His heartbeat changed tune. It now beat out: please stay please stay please stay please stay please stay please stay please stay please stay.

“A’Ling!”

“Uncle!”

The pair yelling across the road broke the enchantment, but not Lan WangJi’s gaze. Jiang WanYin’s voice berating the other cultivators passed through his head without lingering. Only one thought was important: I have to protect Wei Ying from Jiang WanYin. Given the way the Sect leader had captured and tortured demonic cultivators over the past years did not bode well for his treatment of their grandmaster. And then one of the cultivators claimed, “He called Wen Ning out!” And now any chance of keeping the Jiang Sect leader in the dark was gone. Lan WangJi tried to look into Wei Ying’s eyes to give him encouragement. I will protect you. Don’t worry. But Wei Ying was staring firmly, almost as if he was ashamed, at the ground.

“Great. You are back.” Jiang WanYin jumped to the conclusion he reached with every demonic cultivator: this was Wei WuXian returned to the living through some evil magic. Out of the corner of Lan WangJi’s eye he could see Zidian sparking on the other man’s wrist. He quickly spun around, pulling WangJi from it’s storage pouch and used it to send a blast of spiritual energy to block the lightning strike. “Lan WangJi, how dare you!” the other man yelled out.

And then Wei WuXian…. Well, he was pretending to be a madman, wasn’t he? Or was the sane thing here really to run from the protection of HanGuang-Jun? Lan WangJi was unable to stop the second attack which sent Wei WuXian crashing to the ground.

Silence ruled the cultivators as ‘Mo XuanYu’ coughed out dust before groaning and whining as he stood up. “What? You think you can beat people as you will because you are rich and powerful?”

Jiang WanYin looked confused and horrified. “Why didn’t it work?”

And now Lan WangJi understood the reason for whipping ‘Master Mo’: if Wei Ying was spiritually possessing the other body, Zidian would whip the spirit out. But Wei Ying’s soul wasn’t haunting Mo XuanYu. So there was nothing to release.

“Impossible,” the Sect leader continued. “Take off your mask,” he demanded.

The ‘no I won’t’, ‘yes you must’, ‘make me’ style of conversation that followed was a direct echo of their childhood. It was pretty much a weekly event back when the Jiang siblings were studying in Cloud Recesses. Just that alone should have informed Jiang WanYin that this was his ShiXiong.

Lan JingYi may have stopped Jiang WanYin from making that connection when the junior disciple started talking about Zidian’s abilities.

Sometimes Lan JingYi being the most un-Lan-like disciple in the history of the Sect came in handy.

“Tell me,” Jiang WanYing demanded of ‘Mo XuanYu’. “Who are you?”

Oh. Perhaps Lan JingYi wasn’t sufficient to distract the elder. Mentioning that ‘everyone’ believed that the Jiang ShiDi killed his ShiXiong was probably not a wise idea. Especially since it was only untrue because Wei WuXian elected for suicide over fratricide.

Wei WuXian might have decided that fainting was the proper response to the ‘who are you’ question. Or he fainted from being whipped. Whatever the cause, there was a man in black lying in the dirt.

Lan WangJi motioned to his disciples, “Tie him to the donkey. Take him to Cloud Recesses.”

Jiang WanYin started protesting that he should take the demonic cultivator back to Lotus Pier. The Lan disciples ignored him, gathered up the limp body, and left Dafan Mountain.

The long trek back to Cloud Recesses gave Lan WangJi plenty of time to think about how Wei WuXian was here.

One: Lan XiChen had met the real Mo XuanYu in Koi Tower. Master Mo arrived there as a teenager; any attempt to switch bodies there would have been noticed.

Two: it was Wei WuXian playing the role of Mo XuanYu in Mo Manor, and the Mo family accepted that Wei WuXian was their nephew and cousin.

Therefore the switch must have happened after Mo XuanYu was kicked out of the LanLingJin Sect but before he arrived back at Mo Manor. Similar height, weight, hair and playing the part of a mask or crude make-up wearing madman? The Mo family must have accepted any differences due to the length of time spent in Koi Tower, faulty memories and a complete lack of caring about the young man.

So how did the two meet?

Before that…. How did Wei WuXian survive the fall? How did he escape before the mob got to the base of the cliff?

He didn’t have Suibian with him that night. Did he somehow obtain a new sword while he was in the Burial Mounds? And like the many dreams Lan WangJi had, did he fall low enough to be hidden in the smoke and then fly away? If so, where was he all these years? And why come out of hiding now?

More importantly, why come out of hiding in such an obvious manner? Whistling to control corpses? Controlling the Ghost General where thirty or so cultivators could see? He could at least have hidden in the brush first….

For that matter, he could have hidden away in some room in Mo Manor and allowed the Lan to deal with the situation that night. Then took over as heir and lived an uneventful life hiding in plain sight.

Which brought everything back around to the real Mo XuanYu….

Master Mo left Koi Tower and… somehow encountered Wei WuXian. They made an agreement? Master Mo would retire to obscurity and Wei WuXian would adopt the other’s position?

Why?

That’s the part that didn’t make sense. Or rather, one of the many parts that didn’t make sense.

If Master Mo was unwilling to return to his aunt, there was literally nothing stopping him from simply not going home. Nothing.

And according to the junior disciples, the Mo family did not treat ‘Mo XuanYu’ with any sense of respect or decency. He lived in a hovel! So why would Wei WuXian step into a position of being forced to eat disgusting food and receive daily beatings?

None of that made sense. Lan WangJi looked over at his love, lying so still draped across the donkey’s back. Explanations would have to wait until he woke up and wanted to talk.

***

Intrigued? See the rest of the story:

#wangxian #the untamed #chen qing ling #grandmaster of demonic cultivation #wei ying #cql #lan zhan #wei wuxian #lan wangji #post canon #ao3 fanfic #my fic #modern #reborn

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petirrojo57 · 1 year

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2nd Knittiversary!

I got a reminder that 2 years ago today I finished my first ever completed knitting project. My mom showed me the basics when I was a kid over 50 years ago (!) but the whole cast-on/bind-off thingy never took, and I just never got into it… probably was working with leftover not-especially nice yarn either, and I have learned, 2 years on, that I am a yarn snob.

I got interested (yes, seduced into it) as I was reading a very cute and sexy MDZS modern AU in which Lan Wangji takes up knitting to make things that his boyfriend Wei Wuxian will wear and actually keep warm when out and about and the author (link to fic on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27832159/chapters/68138386) mentioned and provided links to the yarn chosen (Malabrigo: I saw their colorways and was hooked, nay, I mentioned seduced? So it was.) I got more invested as the story progressed and even before the story was finished uploading I had bought my first skeins of Malabrigo yarn (Mecha, the bulky superwash merino in Aniversario) and needles and was off to the races looking up how to cast on and get going. It was a simple garter stitch scarf, which you can see in the photo, but I finished it and it’s a squishy, slightly imperfect thing I loved immediately.

The ease of finding yarns (even if in the pandemic I had to gamble on colorways viewed online) and tutorials and patterns meant that I had many ways to pursue this new hobby (dare I say obsession?) and pursue I did. You can see the results of this in the other photo, which was my 2022 completed projects (2021’s wasn’t quite that big, but it wasn’t too far off.) I celebrated by casting on a new project and I still have my cotton baby blanket on needles too, and a half-dozen other ideas rumbling around in my head. It’s a little weird, but I sometimes find myself thinking about my yarn stash and mentally mapping out what colors I’ll use in what stranded knitting pattern — kind of like counting sheep byproducts as I’m trying to fall asleep!

I think I’ll be doing this as long as my hands hold up (darn you, arthritis and trigger finger issues!) and I’ll enjoy every minute — provided I don’t take it into my head to knit another pair of socks.

I really don’t enjoy knitting socks.

#Knitting #knitting journey

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mojoflower · 2 years

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MDZS Prosopagnosia (face blindness) AU

I want an AU of MDZS except Wei Wuxian is face blind. I just feel like that would change so much, adding both comedy and terror to the story overall.

Innocent Youth

Jiang Cheng unwittingly cultivated his shouty persona from a very young age, because he subconsciously realized that his shixiong was more comfortable with him when he stood out from the crowd in this way. Similarly, in the post-resurrection days, jc always lets Zidian spark purple in a very obvious and prolonged way, so wwx doesn't have to linger uncomfortably in an awkward is-he-or-isn't-he-my-brother zone.

Jiang Yanli slowed herself down as a child, becoming very calm and quiet and slow-moving, because that's when her shidi is the most relaxed. She quickly learned the look on his face, when he's trying to figure out who someone is without giving away his weakness... when he's desperately waiting for someone else to use a name, to give him a toe-hold. She always greets everyone by name: just for wwx. She also often announces herself in the third person: others might find it weird, but her didi is always so grateful.

Wwx actually needs to use Jiang Fengmian's unfortunate teeth as a marker to differentiate him from his son, once Jiang Cheng reached his adult height. (The frog on Sandu's hilt really helps, too.)

A lot of the shidis in the Jiang Sect know about wwx's special issues, and totally riff on him by switching their swords and hair ornaments just to fuck with him. They can't switch their fighting styles, though, so the Jiang quickly become a sect where instant spar-offs happen often and are no big deal.

All the people who love wwx have adjusted for this in many ways, realizing that they either need to verbally identify themselves or adapt distinctive clothing/mannerisms/scents/body language.

Wwx wears clothes that don't match any sect because sect uniforms make everyone so homogeneous that he can't even discern gender, much less individual people. (Uniforms actually give him mental heebie jeebies, because they make his life so hard and uncertain.)

Cloud Recesses Student Arc

Wwx has to ask before he fights whether it's going to be friendly or to the death, since he doesn't always know if the person he's fighting is a friend or foe. Wwx defaults to treating all fights as friendly fights (which is why he never even unsheathed his sword when lwj attacked him that first night in Cloud Recesses) because he can't stand the thought of hurting a friend, or just someone innocent.

Lan Wangji is very still. Very still, very quiet, very tall and always wears white and smells of sandalwood. He is easy to recognize. ... Except when he could be Lan Xichen. If there's a smile, or any color, then he's Lan Xichen. (This means that wwx immediately knows who kissed him on Phoenix Mountain, because he doesn't use his sight to identify, well, anyone.)

Nie Huaisang becomes a friend because of his choppy, erratic, fast-paced motions, both when he is speaking and moving. Also, he's unusually short so that helps.

He is secretly fond of Lan Qiren because that dreadful and unflattering beard is such a great identifier. He loves Nie Mingjue because he's literally and distinctly larger than everyone else. Later, he will become immediate friends with Sisi, because dramatic facial scarring is the best cue there is for someone like him. (Is anyone fat? He likes fat people. He likes tattooed people. He'd have loved Mo Xuanyu with his Hanging-Ghost-painted face, because, wow, that's so obvious. Xue Yang's missing pinky finger is so helpful.)

Wei Wuxian knows everyone's swords VERY WELL because he can recognize them and use them to identify which asshole in gold with a peony on his chest (for example) this dude might be. This is what he calls "my poor memory". But it actually means that Jin Zixuan looks exactly like Jin Zixun to him, if not for Suihua.

Burial Mound Days

He's got a string of orphans, and calls them all A-Yuan. No, seriously. Word has got out, and all the homeless babies know they can move into the Burial Mounds and get doted on by EVERYONE because no one there is about to correct the Yiling Patriarch.

Dead Wen Ning is easy to pick out because of his stiff gait, awkward stance and distinctive pallor with the black veins. This makes him an automatic wwx favorite. (The stuttering helped, even back when he was alive.) Wen Qing is tiny, and also, no one else is wearing Wen robes, so she becomes a good friend, too.

He actually really likes all fierce corpses, because the way they move is so distinctive that he always knows what he's dealing with.

Can you imagine how fucking terrifying the world must be when you know that all Wen Zhuliu needs to do is put on a different robe and then he can walk right up to you and wreck your core? Same goes for wrh, jgs, jgy, wc, you name it. Talk about hypervigilance.

Think of all the talismans he's invented to keep himself and the Wen Remnants safe because he knows he can't tell friend from foe and has to count on magic to do it.

Post-Resurrection

Lwj picked up on Jiang Yanli’s habit announcing herself by name instead of using “I”, and consequently uses third person for himself, too. The Junior Ducklings do it, too, although they don't understand why, at first.

Wwx cannot, for the life of him, tell lsz and ljy apart if they just stand quietly next to each other. Ljy will never think this is not hilarious. Especially because wwx will offer them chicken to see which one accepts it. (It’s foolproof.)

He is utterly and completely unable to tell the Twin Jades apart unless they're speaking. Lan Wangji has learned to announce himself simply to protect his brother from being leaped upon and kissed at random intervals. The whole sandalwood thing? Lwj marinates himself in it to give wwx a clue about who he is before he's within liplocking distance.

#MDZS #the untamed #wangxian #MDZS au #wei wuxian #prosopagnosia #face blind wei wuxian #face blindness #yiling patriarch #mojo muses #if anyone is inspired to write this #be sure to tag me!#face blindness is a shitty thing to live with #but it sure can be funny sometimes #and there's that element of horror too

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mdzs-owns-my-ass-i-guess · 1 year

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The duty of those that came before

There are certain things that one cannot do unless they have reached a certain degree of maturity. There are stages to life, there are things that must be done in a certain order, in a certain manner, in a certain rhythm.

There are duties that generations must fulfill towards one another. The young must respect and obey their elders, and their elders must teach, protect and discipline them in turn.

There are things that the young cannot do, no matter how courageous, audacious or powerful they might believe themselves to be.

Lan Qiren knows that this is one of those things.

There are duties that elders must fulfill towards their young, there are things that parents must do for their children.

Lan Qiren never had children of his own, but he had helped raise his brother's. That made him a fatherly figure for them, to an extent - even if he heard neither of his nephews address to him as anything other than uncle. He doesn't know what he would have said if they did, anyway.

But even so, he has always seen Wangji and Xichen as his own, his pride and joy, his hope that the mistakes of the past could be erased by the brilliance of the future.

They have grown well. He doesn't tell them often. If he thinks about it, he probably never has. But he is proud of them. They are strong, intelligent and capable, and despite their transgressions, they've remained pillars of righteousness and power in their sect and beyond.

Perhaps he hasn't always agreed with their choices. This is more the case when it comes to Wangji, but, much like his father (and, if he is to be honest, like Lan Qiren himself) he has always been relentless in the pursuit of what he wanted - and Lan Qiren was powerless to stop him.

Of course, he voiced his opposition at every occasion - but fact of the matter is that Wangji did choose well in the end. He was happy, married to Wei Wuxian, raising a gaggle of juniors that Lan Qiren has always been secretly proud of.

Lan Qiren has had his own issues with Wei Wuxian - but he is not going to pretend that he has always been right in his assessments of the man. He is old enough to recognize his own biases, and he knows he hasn't always been fair towards his nephew's husband.

Yes, he's never going to accept his unorthodox cultivation practices, his propensity for loopholes and rule-breaking, or his shameless displays of affection towards Wangji (not to mention the beard shaving incident a few decades ago) - but Lan Qiren is an honest enough man to admit that he cannot imagine Lan Wangji with anyone else but Wei Wuxian.

Perhaps he will never understand - to willingly take a near fatal punishment for a man draped in sin, to raise a child that bore the blood of your clan's murderers (because Lan Qiren has always known, from the moment Wangji brought the boy in) - but Lan Qiren is aware of the limits of his knowledge. He is not so arrogant as to think he understands everything, much less the breadth and depth of something as complicated as love. After all, he has never experienced it. Not in that way, at least.

But he does love Xichen and Wangji, and he loves Sizhui, the bright, powerful boy that he is, and he even loves that little troublemaker Jingyi that's so much like Wei Wuxian that Lan Qiren himself used to wonder whether he was Wei Wuxian reincarnated sometimes.

And, with all his gripes about the man, his past and his methods, Lan Qiren realizes that he loves Wei Wuxian too, even if only a little bit. He loves him because Wangji does, and if he were to lose Wei Wuxian again, he would die.

And so, Lan Qiren has decided, it is his duty as an elder, as a relative, as a parent, even, to prevent that. It is his duty to save Wangji's life, so he saves Wei Wuxian.

It was a stray shot - a really thin, sharp arrow slicing through the air with incredible speed and a much too obvious target. After all, Wei Wuxian still has many enemies, and even despite the high security in the Cloud Recesses, nobody is infallible.

Lan Qiren hasn't been on a night hunt in a long time. He has spent much of his life among books and treatises, teaching and learning altogether.

Still, his reflex are sharp and his senses honed to near perfection.

He hears the threat before he sees it, and he reacts before he thinks about it.

The pain isn't as sharp as he's expected it to be, but he can feel the arrow - well, technically, it's more of a long, thick needle coated in poison - pierce through him in its entirety, lodging itself right into his heart.

His golden core vibrates in distress under his skin, and he's so distracted with the feeling that he almost doesn't hear Wei Wuxian's scream.

It echoes into the Cloud Recesses, late enough into the night that there's nobody else around. Quite ironic of him to die like this, alone save for somebody he has never hidden his disdain for.

"Let's sit." Lan Qiren says, calm as ever, ignoring Wei Wuxian's tearful, panicked fretting. There is no point for any of that - Lan Qiren knows he is dying, and he wishes to do so peacefully.

They sit underneath a large willow tree.

"Don't cry." Lan Qiren tells Wei Wuxian, "There is nothing to cry for."

"Why... why did you do that?" He manages, levelling his voice enough so that the knot in his throat doesn't obstruct his words entirely. He's shaking, the shock of what just happened drumming adrenaline into his veins, and the realization of what would come next dawning on him like a heavy weight on his shoulders.

Tomorrow, when Lan Wangji returns alongside Lan Xichen, who is finally going to be back from seclusion, they will find their uncle dead.

Tomorrow, they will find their uncle dead because he took a hit that was meant for Wei Wuxian.

"I did it for Wangji." Lan Qiren replies, closing his eyes with a heavy sigh. "If you died again, he would too. I would not be able to bury my s- my nephew."

Wei Wuxian looks at him, fists balled tightly into his robes - Lan Qiren appears entirely unaffected, serene almost. There is only a single droplet of blood on his robes, where the needle had penetrated the skin - otherwise, he looks as elegant, pristine and imposing as always.

"But," Lan Qiren continues, opening his eyes and turning to look at Wei Wuxian, "I did it for you as well."

He stares, eyes wide and unblinking. Lan Qiren distantly notes he looks a lot like his mother now.

"For all the grief I've given you, I would hate it if you died as well." And Lan Qiren finds himself wanting to smile. "I may not agree with much of what you do, but I know you have never been ill-intentioned. And as much as I trust Wangji's judgement, if I did not believe there to be good within you, I wouldn't have... tolerated you here."

Tears fall freely down Wei Wuxian's face and his head hangs low. Lan Qiren clicks his tongue, disapproving. "You have nothing to feel guilt about. This has been my choice and I do not regret it."

"Tomorrow... what should I... they-"

"Wangji and Xichen will understand." And Lan Qiren wants to smile again, feeling only the slightest prickle of tears in his eyes. "They are good boys - no, great men. They would have done the same."

"I thought I was done having my family die for me..." Wei Wuxian manages, squeezing his eyes shut to stop his tears from flowing any more.

"None of that. Didn't I tell you not to blame yourself? Listen to me for once."

A wet, tearful laugh escapes Wei Wuxian at that. "I'm sorry I've been a difficult student."

Lan Qiren finds himself reaching to pet Wei Wuxian's head. "You weren't that bad. If you'd obeyed the rules a little more, I think you would've been one of my best."

He sighs, leaning further against the tree. He feels his extremities slowly going numb, a warm nothingness in place of his legs now.

"There is something that I wish you to pass on to my nephews, Wei Wuxian."

"Anything."

Lan Qiren reaches into one of his sleeves and pulls two envelopes out. "Hand them these letters. I have written them a long time ago, when the Cloud Recesses burned and I did not believe I would survive. I changed some things as years passed, of course, a lot changed since then... But I suppose one could consider these letters to be my... last will."

Wei Wuxian feels himself overcome with emotion again, taking the two letters in hand reverently. He hopes his tears haven't wet the delicate paper.

"The council of elders might give you grief about my death for a while, but do not mind them. They have always been like that. Xichen will need help leading the sect, so I ask you not to leave the Cloud Recesses for a while. I know he will be... fragile now."

Wei Wuxian nods, a few sobs escaping him. He doesn't want to think about that, about everything that will come once Lan Qiren is gone.

"Wangji will be shaken as well. He grieves quietly, which means he tends to isolate himself. Don't try to coax it out of him, he will come to you when he is ready. Take good care of him meanwhile, make sure he eats and sleeps properly, no matter how much he fights it."

Lan Qiren has lost feeling in his arms as well now. The warm numbness is slowly climbing up his torso, with a clear destination.

"I will try my best to respond to Inquiry whenever called upon, so if either of you ever need me, I will be there."

Lan Qiren looks over whatever he can see of the Cloud Recesses from his seat beneath the willow tree, glances up at the starry night sky, and listens to the distant thrill of running water and night birds.

"I have one last thing to ask of you, Wei... Wei Ying."

"Yes, shufu."

Lan Qiren smiles, tearful at last as he feels his heart slow and his breathing heavy. "Tell my nephews... I love them... won't you? And... I'm proud of them... have always been, even if I never said it..."

Two stray droplets fall down his face as his eyes flutter closed, lips drawn apart around his final breath. "And... Wei Ying... you've... done well..."

The moon shines pale on his face like a halo.

#mdzs #mo dao zu shi #writing attempts #lqr #i did not expect this fic to affect me this much #perhaps my xy era isnt so fun

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hanguangbuns · 2 years

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wei wuxian and his attitudes on his sexuality... and the fandom attitudes towards it in turn

so i guess for my first post ill talk about some discussions of sexuality ive seen floating around, mainly pertaining to wei wuxian's sexuality and how he views himself. this isnt any sort of analysis of the direct text or anything but oh it could be. i dont use a lot of direct references to the text for this post, mostly going on pure memory, so take it with a grain of salt.

one thing i see a TON in fandom and transformative fandom spaces is this incessant need to label a favorite character's sexuality one way or another, whether it be a sexuality the person likes to project themselves on or something else. thats not to say that its necessarily WRONG to do so—i love it when my dear mutuals see themselves in a character i think its very endearing & exciting, and in fact, there had been many times where i did some self-exploration of my own sexuality through characters. the problem i mostly have is when people get heated or even obsessive over something like a label.

i think for so long, there's been this discussion of wei wuxian's sexuality where, though mostly in good faith, comes to a point where you have to wonder if it even matters in the canon context. whether he’s bi, gay, straight, etc... it all comes down to the fact that in the story, they (wei wuxian and lan wangji) don't label themselves at all, and neither does the author. yes there is the term "cut-sleeve", which as we all know, is mostly used, almost in the negatory in the mdzs universe—the origins of the term “cut-sleeve” itself is referred to the story of Emperor Ai of the Han dynasty, who cut off his sleeve so as to not wake his sleeping lover. cut-sleeve itself is an allusion to homosexuality, but not the full label.

so what does this mean? well for starters, on twitter, there has been this lovely thread by twitter user flowerofgusu, who does a detached translation of chapter 111, and noticed a few key things. what i want to focus on is the first tweet, where translation differences are highlighted in that line. i implore you all to read the thread (its short!), because i dont want to trample all over it. but keeping it simple, we can see that there is a BIG difference between reading a wei ying who always thought himself as heterosexual, and a wei ying who just simply never thought himself “in that way”

i think this could open up a lot of discussion on how sexuality is handled in mdzs, and how wei ying’s own attitude toward sexuality is written. the author of the thread noticed that wei ying’s attitudes lines up well with the concept of “demisexuality.” and it makes sense! we know that lan wangji is the only person that wei wuxian has ever come to love intimately, and whole-heartedly. but again, the thing is, its a label, and whether or not it was intentional, we will never know if he is demi for sure. and that’s ok! in my opinion, characters dont have to have labels, and we know that wei wuxian can be perfectly happy living the rest of his life without labeling himself in any specific way.

(side note, now im seriously wondering if a “lack of label” is also a phenomenon of me wanting to project too—personally im someone who doesnt really stick to one, so i wonder if this is also me projecting in a sense. lol)

anyways, my problem with all of this arises because of a couple of attitudes of seen in response to the thread. i wont link it, and honestly i think the issue seems to pertain to the way fandom views characters’ sexuality in general. that discussing how characters might be demi, or acespec, or even just someone with no labels, is met with attitudes of “you’re erasing bisexuality” or “he is gay!!1!”; when ppl introduce the book, its “the main character is a bisexual necromancer!”. these claims are generally in good faith but, the problem is, they are not backed by the canon text either. i wont sit here and talk about other series or other characters, but i know for sure wei wuxian isnt labeled at all. heres what we know:

that, in his first life, he teased and flirted a little, if only to make friends or get something in return, like food, or a perfume sachet.

he was rumored to be someone who ravishes virgin maidens every night, which no, he didnt. he hung out with some ghost maidens one time and lived alongside some poor farmers in the burial mounds. he died a virgin too

he experiences moments of comphet on few occasions, most notably in xuanwu cave where he told lan wangji “he doesnt like men”—i wrote a bit on this but i went back to read the text in its full context, and wei wuxians proclamation of “i dont like men!” seems to be more of a way to assure lan wangji that he wont take advantage of him, rather than him being so assured of his sexuality. since i dont have access to the original text, let's leave this for another day.

in the phoenix mountain kiss, he assumed that the person who stole his first kiss was a strong, but shy maiden. again, comphet at play, and never considers the possibility of it being a man

in his second life, he plays what he thinks not only how a cut-sleeve acts, but how mo xuanyu acts. when he first wakes up, he plays the act of a lunatic, then attempts to play it up to his advantage when he learns that mo xuanyu is homosexual. not once does wei wuxian himself ever harbor any negative feelings or disgust towards mo xuanyu being gay, or towards homosexuality at all.

in fact, up until the moment wei wuxian starts to fall in love with lan wangji, and when he realized he did, he never once fantasized about him being in a serious intimate situation with anyone, nonetheless even a man! his first life had been a lifetime of struggle, a struggle to conform, and a struggle through war, and a struggle to stand up whats right. whats notable is that although he and lan wangji met only on several occasion, it was enough to make a huge impression on each other—and for wei wuxian tell jiang yanli all about his new friend in the cloud recesses!

anyways the point is, wei wuxian never labels himself, but neither does he ever think about his sexuality in any meaningful way, whether because he “didnt have time”, or because he just simply didnt see the need to. i think the lack of a label on a character, or, really, a person, not only means that they dont care about how to define themselves, but because they just simply dont see the need to. wei wuxian is someone in the latter—he is a carefree person that goes with the flow, and doesnt get hung up so easily over any little thing.

this brings up another point ive thought about a lot—why use these western labels to define fictional characters living in an ancient fantasy china? especially terms where they have only been recently defined within the past couple hundred years. i think there is a lot to discuss when it comes to imposing western views of sexuality onto foreign art and media, especially media that, rather than try to label subjects any specific way, aims to tell a story rather than focus on identity politics. (i think this goes into why danmei itself is pretty appealing to a lot of people—it doesnt focus on the labels of its characters, but rather the characters themselves going “i love this person for themself, and not because im gay”. of course, there could be few exceptions, but generally, it is popular for the main couples in danmei to be wholeheartedly devoted to each other, no matter if they have been in several relationships before, or none at all)

another phenomenon ive seen in the fandom which was subject to a lot of discussion, is “sbwy”, or straight boy wei ying. generally i do think its inherently a harmless concept, and one that can be fun in a comedic setting, and especially wonderful when it comes to things like “coming of age” fics or analysis. the problem is. too many a time have i seen bad-faith criticism of the novel that claims… that wei wuxian was actually “straight” in his first life, and him taking the body of a gay man means he suddenly turned gay and that means mxtx deleiberately wrote this and is homophobic and blah blah blah—

just. full stop. i think at that point, anyone who thinks that probably didn’t read the novel lbr. wei ying was never implied to be “straight” in his first life—like i mentioned, he flirted with girls and generally never thought about himself in “that way”, but the whole point of the flashback arcs were to bring to light certain contexts that the present arcs needed, and to highlight the relationship between wei wuxian and lan wangji at that time. its rocky, but generally, they had a better relationship than what most people thought. we know that lan wangji didnt want his feelings known to anyone, and especially wei wuxian; so wei wuxian himself had no reason to know of it at all. and it makes sense—by the time lan wangji himself realized it, it was much too late, and wei wuxian had deemed him an outsider to his problems. theres nothing he could do to help without overstepping boundaries, so he chose to respect it (generally).

anyways what im saying here is that wei wuxian wasn’t straight in his first life—he just never had any reason to think about his sexuality. he was and is carefree, and i think his attitude towards his sexuality carefree as well. when he started realizing he was catching feelings for lan wangji, his first thought wasn’t “but im not gay!”, it was “oh my god. i might be gay. i might be gay and i might be gay for my best friend and i dont know what to do about it does he like me back i hope he likes me back aakdjklgfdhlkf;ds” (please note that i use the term “gay” loosely, not that im making any straightforward comment on what his sexuality might be, ty) he’s flexible with his attitude towards his own sexuality, not really claiming he’s any one thing, but instead, focusing on the most important object of his desires, lan wangji.

(discussions of sex incoming)

he was never inclined to seek out gay erotica in his first life, and he was never inclined to that kind of interests, and he was never inclined to sex at all. we know that in his first life, he died a virgin and never felt any kind of desire like that at all. in his second life, he becomes interested in sex—most noteably, interested in sex with lan wangji. lan wangji is the object of his desires, and throughout the entire story, no one ever catches his eye quite like the second jade of lan. he unlocks a desire within himself that he himself has never known, and from then on, hes more inclined to do anything with lan wangji. its exhilarating, its scary, its wonderful, and most of all, wei ying is happy. hes happy and excited and satisfied! wangxian never put labels on themselves throughout the novel, and theyre happy with that. when they realize the depth of their feelings for each other, theres no going back—it feels natural to them, so why go through the trouble of putting labels for themselves?

to close off i wanna say, headcanon whatever you want! whether wei wuxian is gay, bi, straight, demi, whatever, its all up to interpretation! and having civil discussions about it can be fun, and can bring people a whole different perspective than what they thought before. but i think its silly to claim that wei wuxian has to be one or the other, and if ppl hc him being a label you think is incorrect, its morally wrong to do so. in my opinion, i think the lack of putting a label on a sexuality can be really refreshing, and for wei wuxian, it seems to do him just fine.

#mdzs #wei wuxian #lan wangji #wangxian #mxtx #ik this is like very loose and handwavy but im learning as i go along blease bear with me ty<3

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robininthelabyrinth · 3 years

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Imagine if Meng Shi begged and bargained and collected favors till she was able to send her A-Yao to education with the Lan Sect, perhaps even become a cultivator with them. Would he take that change? Would he become a rogue cultivator? Would the strict rules help curb his inner muderimpuls or enrage him or teach him to hide better?

A Good Fit - ao3

“The…Lan sect?” Meng Yao said doubtfully. “Are you sure?”

“I am sure,” his mother said, her mouth tight. She looked upset, the way she always did these days when he referenced, intentionally or otherwise, the original plan that she had had to send him to join his father, sect leader of Lanling Jin. She’d raised Meng Yao on a steady diet of stories of what his life would be like when his father finally took him back the way he’d promised her he would, stories that had filled his days and nights for years and years and years, and then just last year she’d suddenly stopped talking about it entirely. It was as if the person who’d told those stories had nothing to do with her.

Meng Yao didn’t know what had happened, but he assumed it must have been pretty bad.

“It'll be a good fit,” she added.

“Then I’ll go to the Lan sect,” he said, and pretended not see the way his mother relaxed a little, relieved that he wasn’t asking too many questions. “I’ve heard they are gentlemen there, righteous but gentle; it will be the best match for my personality, I’m sure.”

A lie, of course. ‘Gentlemen’ were just as likely to come to the brothel as brutes, and they were all the same once they had a cup of wine and a beauty in their arms – Meng Yao tried not to have any illusions.

“Can we afford it?” he asked instead, since that was something he was sure his mother would have thought of, would have expected him to ask. “Gusu is so far away…”

“I have obtained a letter from the local sect recommending you to their sect leader, Lan Qiren,” she said. “He’s the one that teaches the classes – the one that sent out the summons asking the subsidiary sects to look for individuals with raw talent to join his classes and offering them an extra seat for their sects for each nameless orphan they find that lives up to Lan sect standards. Only the Heavens know why he’s doing something like that…I assume they’re trying to expand.”

That seemed like the most reasonable explanation. Meng Yao nodded. “So I’ll be traveling with the local sect?”

“That’s right,” his mother said, and raised her chin a little. “At least this much, your mother was able to do for you.”

She’d begged and bargained and traded favors for it, then, Meng Yao thought, and yet taking him along was to their own benefit: if they were looking for inherited cultivation talent sufficient for the Lan sect, then the bastard son of another Great Sect leader would be a better bet than some random nobody. She’d probably humiliated herself for nothing.

“Will you come with me?” he asked, more concerned with that – it was too easy for women of ill repute to disappear into the depths of the city if they didn’t have someone to watch out for them.

Even someone as young as he was. He wished he was older.

“You can come back to visit me during the Spring Festival,” she said, which meant no. “I’ll be all right, A-Yao.”

Meng Yao wasn’t so sure.

Still, not having him around would at least remove a visible reminder of his mother’s age – she’d been kicked out of the better brothels because of him, because no one wanted a woman who was a mother. Leaving would at least do that for her.

“I’ll write,” he finally said. “I’ll write as often as they let me.”

“And I’ll write back,” she promised him, kissing his cheek. “I promise.”

With that, Meng Yao supposed he had to be satisfied.

The Lan sect was both exactly like what Meng Yao expected and absolutely nothing at all like anything he could have dreamt.

For the first, his cynicism was almost immediately confirmed: the boys raised there were snobby as anything, looking down at the rest of them as little better than barbarians, and many of the adults were the same way. It was clear that this whole business of recruiting talented nobodies was a project of the sect leader’s – the interim sect leader, no less, not even the real thing – and nobody else’s; they were only just barely going along with it. Adding to that the fact that there were dozens if not hundreds of rules, and Meng Yao could glumly foresee a future of having his lack of knowledge held over his head as a fault, even with his marvelous memory to act as his backing.

For the second…

Well, there was Lan Xichen, who was – as unbelievable as it seemed – to actually embody all those things that people said about gentlemen, all kindness and gentleness and fierce upright pride, except only for real. There was Lan Wangji, who was basically perfect in every way and kinder than he gave the impression he was, willing to help tutor anyone who asked if only they dared disturb his solitude long enough to do so. There was the boy Meng Yao shared a room with, Su She, who’d punched the boy from the Yunping cultivator clan in the mouth for calling Meng Yao a son of a whore and pretended it was because they weren’t allowed to talk about that sort of thing, when actually it’d been because he hadn’t wanted rumors to get around that might make Meng Yao’s life harder in the future.

There was Lan Qiren, who was strict and a little boring but fair, painfully fair, handing out punishments with an equitable hand no matter that it meant that he was punishing the locals as often if not more often. It’d been his idea to bring people like Meng Yao into the Lan sect, and defending the idea was the only time he truly seemed moved to passion. Now that they’d passed the initial examination and been judged to match Lan sect standards, Lan Qiren announced, as far as he was concerned, they were Lan sect just as if they were born there, as if they’d been children of his own.

And he even seemed to really believe it, too.

Today, Meng Yao’s head was still warm from when the stern Teacher Lan had put his hand there, gentle and approving, and his ears still burning from the murmured “Well done, Meng Yao, as expected.”

“I think I would kill someone for him,” Meng Yao said dreamily to Su She, who snorted.

“You’ve got such father issues,” he said disdainfully, as if he didn’t have entire family issues. That was just Su She’s way, though – he bitched and moaned and complained without end, and he’d probably kill someone for Meng Yao if Meng Yao so much as hinted it was something he’d want. They’d made friends for a reason. “You know the bit about the poor kids being his own children is a lie, right?”

“I know which sect’s leader is my father, thanks,” Meng Yao said, rolling his eyes. “I’m well aware it’s not Teacher Lan. Like he’d ever have kids of his own, anyway.”

“That’d require noticing when someone’s flirting with him,” Su She agreed, all solemn for just a moment, and then he dissolved into sniggering giggles. Meng Yao couldn’t blame him: it was, in fact, extremely funny when women (and sometimes men) tried to flirt with Teacher Lan, mostly because of the way that he very genuinely and completely missed that that was what was happening each and every time.

“Laugh all you like,” Meng Yao said peaceably. “You’d kill for him, too.”

“Probably,” Su She agreed. “But only because of you.”

That was fair enough. After getting the lay of the land, Meng Yao had arranged for them to ‘accidentally’ be overheard by Teacher Lan while talking about the misconduct of one of the teachers who was the most biased against guest disciples, one of the ones that had been harassing Su She in particular for over a year before Meng Yao had arrived, and despite Su She’s initial nervousness about the plan, it had all gone splendidly. Sure, they’d been punished to do five copies of a treatise on upright conduct because they’d breached Talking behind the backs of others is prohibited, but the teacher in question had been sentenced to two hundred strikes with the discipline rod for abusing his position and three months of enforced seclusion to contemplate his misbehavior, and then, Teacher Lan had said, his expression dark and threatening, they could discuss what role would be the best fit in the future.

The other teachers had taken notice and shaped up very quickly, after that.

Comparatively, those five copies made in the nice cool Library Pavilion instead of having to do chores on the hottest days of summer? Practically a pat on the back for bringing it to his attention.

Su She would never have dared to raise anything if it was just him, Meng Yao thought; he had a strange fear of authority figures that combined envy and misery in an explosive combination – he would have just suffered and suffered and suffered until he’d been pushed too far and then it would have all burst out at once. He wasn’t like Meng Yao, who was unwilling to keep to his “proper” place and was more than willing to use his greater-than-average share of brains to get what he wanted, no matter what rules he broke in the process. He was the sort of person who was willing to do whatever it took to obtain his desires – no matter what it took.

Well, maybe not no matter what. He wouldn’t want to disappoint Lan Qiren too much.

(Okay, so maybe Su She was right and he had some unresolved father issues. So what if he did? Whose business was it but his?)

It’d taken Meng Yao a while to fully adjust to the Cloud Recesses.

Some parts he’d figured out right away – the way they all flattered themselves as gentlemen even if they were actually little more than hypocrites (Teacher Lan and his personally taught nephews exempted, of course), which of course meant that Meng Yao’s ability to act pitiful at the drop of a hat and cleverly turn black into white made him a teacher’s pet at once. The vegetarian meals were easy enough to adapt to, given that his mother hadn’t had the money for meat all that often, and the training and cultivation and all that wasn’t any challenge for his excellent powers of retention – he had ambitions of becoming one of Teacher Lan’s aides one day, and worked assiduously towards that goal. Even waking and sleeping early, which was practically the opposite of his schedule at home, was something he could adjust to, given time and incentive.

It was his mentality that took some time to adjust.

Meng Yao had perhaps grown up with too many of his mother’s stories, painting an image of a matchless paradise – at the start, he looked at everything around him, serene and elegant but not quite as rich and shining and thought that it would do, for now. When he’d first arrived, he had had every intention of making a good reputation for himself and using that reputation to get his real father’s attention – he’d liked Teacher Lan from the beginning, despite his best attempts to not let his heart be swayed, but he’d reasoned that if a teacher was like this, then a blood-related father would be even better.

And so, for the first half-year, he’d treated his time at the Cloud Recesses…not lightly, no. He was extremely serious about making sure to get the maximum benefit he could. And yet, at the same time, he still was not really committing himself to the place.

This wasn’t where he was going to live his whole life, he reasoned; it was just a stepping stone to a better future. That meant he would exert himself to point out things that made him look good, to eliminate obstacles in his path, to win himself allies, but not bother with those longer-term problems, the ones that really ought to be fixed but which would take a great deal of effort with little reward other than annoying people.

His feeling of superiority and emotional distance lasted right up until the first discussion conference.

From a distance, Jin Guangshan was everything Meng Yao could have imagined – perhaps a little too similar to the clients that his mother often saw, a little dissolute to pull off the air of a refined scholar he affected, but wearing more gold than Meng Yao had ever seen in his life, with a retinue of servants that dwarfed the other sect’s. Each of those servants were dressed more finely than even main clan cultivators in some of the smaller sects, and though Meng Yao’s Lan sect guest disciple clothing was of such quality that he didn’t need to fear their disdain, he couldn’t help but be secretly impressed.

He'd exerted himself more than usual to trade away all of his chores and duties, freeing himself up to take on patrol duty near the Jin sect. He’d perhaps daydreamed about some sort of encounter – nothing active on his part, of course, but he couldn’t quite resist playing through some fantasy of catching someone’s eye by chance, getting called over, a “You have a familiar set to your chin, who’s your father?”, a shy halting admission, recognition, a joyous reunion…

Instead, his father spent the entire night getting drunk and cursing the Lan sect’s hospitality for not providing him with girls to go with his liquor, calling Lan Qiren a miserable prude with a stick up his ass right in front of the Lan sect disciples that clenched their fists in barely concealed rage. He’d seen Meng Yao all right, ordered him to come forward, but it’d only been to mock him in front of all of his servants – and not even for being his bastard son, no, that would involve bothering to pick him out from the crowd or to ask who he was. No, he’d mocked him simply for being one of the poor disciples that Lan Qiren had taken in, all because his accent was marked with the distinct tones of Yunping rather than the sweetness of Gusu.

“Tell me, boy,” he said, breathing fumes into Meng Yao’s face and making him feel suddenly as if he’d never left the brothel – that the Cloud Recesses had all been a vague dream, and now he’d woken up and lost it all. “How does that old fart Qiren expect you to pay him back for all he’s done for you? I heard the Lan sect includes a pretty face as one of its standard requirements…”

Meng Yao put his gaze above his father’s head and pretended to be deaf.

“It seems like rather a lot of effort,” one of his father’s attendants remarked. “Even if Second Master Lan wanted a boy to warm his bed, couldn’t he just buy one like any normal person?”

“Bah, boys,” his father said, and leaned back, waving his hands in dismissal. “Why would anyone bother with a boy when you could have a soft woman instead? Just as long as they’re stupid enough – you know, there’s nothing worse than a woman who’s talented and knows it, too smart, always trying to get above their station…”

“You’re thinking about that whore in Yunping again, aren’t you? The one that interrupted your dinner and made a scene, claiming you’d promised to take in the son she bore you?” the attendant said, laughing. “I told you, you should’ve just killed her for her impudence rather than just having her beaten and thrown out. That way the matter wouldn’t still be bothering you…”

“Go away, boy,” another servant said to Meng Yao, who was frozen stiff in belated terror, nausea churning in his stomach as he realized his mother could’ve gone out one day and never come back, and he would never have known why – or maybe it was that he’d been spending his considerable time and brain on pleasing someone who would have done that, who nearly had done that. “Your accent’s brought back bad memories, don’t you see?”

Meng Yao left.

No, to be more blunt: he fled. He ran away, hot tears filling his eyes until he couldn’t see – belly full of regret and disappointment, crushed dreams feeling like broken shards of glass in his mouth and throat.

He tried to tell himself that it was better to find out now, when they were still distant, before he'd sold his soul for the futile chance to get that horrible man's affection, but he couldn't quite throw off the shame of knowing that if he hadn't heard such a thing up front, he probably would have done that. Would have humiliated himself like that, and for what? A man who regretted not murdering his mother?

He ran right into Lan Wangji, who was also on patrol.

Lan Wangji took one look at him and grabbed his wrist, dragging him away from the main pathway and all the way to his uncle’s rooms.

Lan Qiren was still awake despite the late hour, writing something at his desk, but he set aside his brush at once. “What’s going on?” he asked, frowning. “Wangji – Meng Yao – one of you report.”

“Meng Yao was on patrol by the Jin sect,” Lan Wangji explained as Meng Yao furiously tried to dash away his tears using his sleeve.

“Who permitted that? First year disciples aren’t permitted to patrol during discussion conferences,” Lan Qiren asked, his frown deepening. “It wouldn’t be proper – ah, but no, I recall now. I suppose it was inevitable. Wangji, well done, and thank you. You are dismissed.”

After Lan Wangji left, he turned his eyes on Meng Yao.

“You volunteered, didn’t you?” he asked.

Meng Yao felt his back go cold: Lan Qiren knew, then. It had never been said out loud by anyone as far as he knew, and yet it was clear that Lan Qiren knew who his father was – and probably his mother, too.

He knew that Meng Yao was – that he wasn’t anything more than –

“You are one of my most promising disciples, Meng Yao,” Lan Qiren told him, and poured him a cup of tea from his own pot, pressing it into his hands. It was finer tea than Meng Yao had ever had in his life, full of smoke and flavor. “The rules say Be loyal and filial, but they also praise reciprocity. You have not been recognized, and have not received your forefathers’ grace. You can fulfill your obligations to chivalry through your respect for the parent that raised you.”

Meng Yao stared down at the teacup. Lan Qiren had completely misunderstood the nature of Meng Yao’s concern – he was disappointed in what his father was, not worried about not living up to his obligations of being a filial child. And yet it was a little nice to hear that as far as Lan Qiren was concerned, the rules said that he could tell his father go hang for all he cared…

And that he ought to honor his mother, which was something no one who knew her had ever said to him.

“Even if she –” His voice stuttered. “Even if she’s a…”

He couldn’t say the word.

“Appreciate the good people is not qualified by class or profession,” Lan Qiren said, and his monotone voice was blissfully without emotion, as if this were just another lesson in class, and not the deepest hurt of Meng Yao’s life. “I have never met your mother, Meng Yao, but you are a good child – diligent, organized, sincere, with good judgment, and you clearly adore her. That tells me everything I need to know.”

Meng Yao burst into tears.

Meng Yao liked Lan Xichen a lot, but he also had to admit that sometimes, the older boy was, well…

“Dumb as a pile of rocks,” Su She announced.

“Do not criticize other people,” Meng Yao said piously, but then chuckled, shaking his head. “Say, rather, that he’s naïve and sheltered, and overly inclined to believe the best in people.”

“Like I said: dumb as rocks. How many times is going to get himself swindled into being someone’s sword or shield before he figures out that the problem is him?”

“Some people don’t have the capacity to understand the depths of humanity’s foulness –”

“Yeah, dumb ones.”

“Su She, please.” Su She held up his hands in surrendered. “At any rate, if Lan-gongzi is going to keep falling for people’s tricks, it’s beholden on us to help protect him.”

“You just don’t want Teacher Lan to be sad about something serious happening to his nephew,” Su She said knowingly, but he was already nodding. “All right, what are we going to do about it? He outranks us. We can’t exactly tell him to his face that he’s being…”

He paused.

Dumb as rocks went unsaid, but then, it didn’t need to be said out loud for the meaning to be clear.

Meng Yao sighed.

“You can only trick someone so many times,” he said. “If we want to keep him from getting tricked by other people, then we have to trick him first. And better.”

“What do you mean?”

“Lan-gongzi likes to save people,” Meng Yao explained. “He really sees himself as a chivalrous gentleman – he puts chivalry first, even though Teacher Lan says Learning comes first. That’s why he always sides with whoever he perceives to be the underdog in a given situation, no matter how wrong that impression is. That’s how most of the people who’ve been tricking him have gone for it: playing the victim, appealing to his sense of righteousness, pulling the curtains over his eyes to obscure what’s actually happening.”

“Okay. So?”

“So, we’ve both got miserable backstories – you being taken from your family at a young age and then bullied, me with my mother and, even worse, father. If we get him on our side, early on, he’ll side with us over anyone else – that way we can keep him from getting roped into other people’s private grudges.”

Su She frowned. “That seems a little manipulative.”

“It’s for his own good, and that’s what’s important,” Meng Yao said, and smiled faintly. “Wouldn’t you agree, Lan-er-gongzi?”

Su She jumped, turning around just in time to see Lan Wangji, who had been standing in the shadow of a nearby tree, step out.

He had a serious expression, as always, but a thoughtful one.

Meng Yao waited patiently.

“You cannot take advantage,” Lan Wangji finally said, and Meng Yao knew he’d won the most important ally in the battle to save Lan Xichen from himself. “That would change it from a virtuous act to a selfish one.”

“Like we need anything from him,” Su She said haughtily. “Maintain your own discipline.”

“Arrogance is forbidden.”

“It’s not arrogance if it’s justified! It’s just self-confidence!”

“Do not argue with family,” Meng Yao quoted, and was pleased to see both of them drop it at once. “Listen, we all share the same goal, and we have to start somewhere, don’t we? We’re stronger together than apart. Together, we can do anything, even protect Lan-gongzi.”

That and more, he thought as the other boys nodded, following his lead. Lan Xichen is just the start.

“The Wen sect will make trouble sooner rather than later,” Meng Yao said thoughtfully, one day. His friends turned to look at him. “Yes, I’m serious.”

Lan Wangji nodded, serious as always, but Su She scoffed.

“You can’t even convince that Wei Wuxian boy to leave poor Lan-er-gongzi alone,” he said snidely. “How exactly are you expecting to bring down the Wen sect?”

“I don’t convince Wei Wuxian to leave Lan-er-gongzi alone because Lan-er-gongzi doesn’t want to be left alone,” Meng Yao said. “Obviously. Isn’t that right?”

“You should call me by name,” Lan Wangji said, which wasn’t answering the question and definitely wasn’t denying anything. “You were saying, about the Wen sect?”

Meng Yao smiled.

“What brings one of Teacher Lan’s most promising disciples to the Unclean Realm?” Nie Mingjue said, peering at him thoughtfully. “You’re at the wrong time to be one of the usual messengers.”

Meng Yao smiled at him.

“I think you’ll find that we have similar goals, Sect Leader Nie,” he said. “When it comes to making sure that certain people in our lives don’t get hurt by the bad decisions of others, I mean. In your case, it’s your younger brother, who’s a friend of mine –”

Friend, source of information, it was all about the same thing in the end. Meng Yao didn’t have real friends outside the Lan sect, but he’d been very careful to cultivate good relationships with all his most important peers.

“- and for me, well. A teacher for day, a father for a lifetime. I’m sure Sect Leader Nie can understand the importance of protecting one’s father – right?”

“You don’t need to use any sophistry on me,” Nie Mingjue said, rolling his eyes. “If you have an idea on what we can do to stop the Wen sect before they go and burn someone’s house down, I’m all ears.”

By chance, Meng Yao did.

It was a good plan, too, daring and brave in equal measure. If it worked the way he hoped it would, he’d win enough fame to get Jin Guangshan to beg for him to join the Jin sect – not that he would, of course.

Meng Yao knew what he wanted, and he knew how he was going to get it, too.

“This is a lovely house, A-Yao,” Meng Shi said, running her hand along one of the soft tapestries on the wall. “Truly lovely. Whoever you rented it from has good taste.”

Meng Yao bowed. “Thank you for the compliment, Mother. I put a lot of thought into it.”

“You own it?” she asked, surprised. “But don’t you live up the mountain, with the sect?”

“I do. This is for you.”

“For – me? A-Yao! This is too much – how much must it have cost–”

“I saved the Lan sect’s core texts from being destroyed,” Meng Yao said. “I’m an inner sect disciple now – I could ask for a dozen houses like this, and they’d grant them to me without blinking twice. Teacher Lan would insist on it.”

“Teacher Lan,” his mother murmured. “That’s the one you’ve taken to treating as your own father, isn’t it? You’ve spoken so much of him, in your letters…”

“There’s no need to scheme,” he told her. “He wouldn’t notice your flirtations, anyway.”

His mother arched her eyebrows at him.

“He’s really oblivious.”

“Still…”

“Really no need,” Meng Yao said, and couldn’t help but smile at the memory of Lan Qiren pulling him into a hug when he realized that the books – and Lan Xichen – were all safe from the Wen sect’s attempt to burn down the Cloud Recesses, and, later, again, that Wen Ruohan was dead. He may have deliberately schemed for that second hug, and he might or might not have plans for more. “He already takes me as a son.”

His mother relaxed.

“Good,” she said, and smiled herself. “So, A-Yao, was I right, all those years ago? Was the Lan sect a good fit for you?”

“Yes, Mother,” Meng Yao said. “Yes, it was.”

#mdzs #meng yao #jin guangyao #lan qiren #su she #lan wangji #my fic #my fics #a good fit

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jiangwanyinscatmom · 3 years

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What are your thoughts on the comphet WWX debacle? Like i personally feel like it’s such an exaggeration for him same as the “lololol clown didn’t notice LWJ liked him” thing, like we can all agree that romantic or physical relationships were the least of WWX’s priorities during his first life and yeah he assumed he must have been straight since he never liked a boy before (but actually never liked a girl either) but it isn’t like he struggled with himself and felt any shame or guilt or whatever when he started falling for LWJ he accepted it pretty fast his only worry was that he didn’t want to impose those feelings on LWJ, so the whole sbwy and comphet HCs though funny when treated in a lighthearted way i find them pretty hyperbolic when people make it out to be a big main theme of the novel and claim it’s pretty much what the whole thing was about *shrugs*

So, my take in concern to this particular fandom obsession is, that no I don't agree with the usual popularity of "WWX was straight boy turned gay/ struggling with loving a man", that a lot of fanon loves to make within fics particularly modern ones based within america (insert spongebob judging fish here).And we have Shen Yuan for this if people want an in denial totally tropey in denial gay, come on guys, get the books right at least here as that is an actual big plot point for SVSSS and Shen Yuan being a neet loser.

I find it particularly distasteful, offensive, outdated, etc. to him as a character anyways. As his usual flirting towards others are light hearted and quiet chivalrous towards girls when he is young to make them comfortable and laugh. His most overt sexual overtures actually concern Lan Wangji throughout the novel as well as many of his more romantic thoughts even if he himself does not delve deeply into the why of it when he was younger.

His sexuality is never an issue for him nor does he ever think badly of the thought of gay men in general, (this particular point is saved for Jiang Cheng within the text compared to Wei Wuxian). The only comphet he displays, is just what I'd consider what many LGBT individuals face growing up within very straight households. Sometimes they just don't think of the fact that they may be gay, he has also been around Jiang Cheng himself who pressed that his early interest in Lan Wangji was strange with every interaction. Which I have wrote about before. Being around an overt homophobe does not make it easy to explore deeper into your own sexuality or deeply about it when they say it's weird to think so much about a same gendered interest.

Wei Wuxian does not display many of the rather western traits of what is considered western comphet takes. He is not prone to displaying overt masculinity (aka, american jock boy playboy, GAG). He doesn't shy away from affection towards Lan Wangji even as a friend. The man is more than comfortable sleeping in the same bed as Lan Wangji for two months until it is when Jiang Cheng is the one to instill the idea that Lan Wangji sees it as shameful and does not reciprocate. Wei Wuxian worries that Lan Wangji is just too polite to actually say anything against it.

He weaponizes others homophobia as seen when it came to Jiang Cheng and Jin Ling. He rather quickly gives up on it with Lan Wangji, unless it is to actually tease him as he had done when he was younger which by the point of Qinghe and their find of the torso, is meant to be his usual form of flirting which he later notes can be considered as cruel due to the circumstances that happened between the two and perceived rejection.

The main theme has more to do with him being able to accept the love and safety that is given to him unconditionally. He had usually always been the one to give that while hurting himself, Lan Wangji being a man has very little to do with his acceptance as he full heartedly confesses once he knows that his feelings are reciprocated.

#mdzs #mo dao zu shi #lol homophobe wwx #just say you don't understand him as a character if you write straight boy WY #ughhh shivers as I even write that

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vrishchikawrites · 3 years

Note

Could I have a prompt? 🥺🥺 So WWX is taking bath in the Cold Pond to heal from the wounds by the discipline paddle (which I assume he was punished being clothed in his Black robe or in his Gusu Lan disciple robes or Head disciple Jiangs robes whichever fits). Before going to CR, wwx is whipped by mdm yu and LWJ notices wwx’s raw red scars and many scars across his back kinda overlapping and not yet being healed because maybe MDM yu sealed his core or something. LWJ, or with LXC saw WWX’s many crisscrossing scars and realize they’re still raw and kinda risking for infection because when mdm yu unseals his spiritual energy before going to CR, WWX never thought of healing it. Cue LWJ and LXC gets horrified and ask WWX why he had many scars on his back (or other parts of his body can also be included!) no pressure 💕 I love your writing! ❤️❤️

Anyway, it is set during the period in which WWX studies at CR. Lån Qiren, who is obviously not eyeing Wei Wuxian just in case the boy creates some trouble ends up realizing that he is too non chalant about not eating (because the food there is for rabbits) and WWX is like "Oh, yeah. Nah its fine, I've been worse".

This one has trigger warnings for child abuse, negligence, and issues related to eating habits. Keep that in mind before proceeding. Nothing graphic, but I wanted to warn nonetheless.

I've merged two prompts here.

Please remember that prompts are closed. Also, remember I do not write self-deprication. All prompts that require WWX to have low self-esteem are not going to be written, apologies but the subject is very uncomfortable for me and I don't believe it is canon accurate anyways.

On to the prompt fill.

"That Wei child is entirely too careless."

Lan Qiren closes his eyes and prays for patience. That boy has been a menace ever since he stepped into Cloud Recesses. Brilliant but wily and mischievous with absolutely no regard for rules.

"What has he done?" He asks gruffly, reading over the reports from the kitchen staff. Cloud Recesses always monitors the food intake of their guests to make sure everyone is well-fed and no one is consuming more than their due. It wouldn't do for young cultivators to fall ill in their care, after all.

The primary healer, a matron of some age, had brought the reports instead of the kitchen manager, which was quite unusual, "He forgets meals. Goes without food for days. Survives on small bits of fruit."

Xichen, who has been working on his own reports, raises his head and looks concerned.

Lan Qiren crosses his arms, feeling a growing sense of ire, "He dislikes our meals." He's not the first one to skip meals because he considers them 'bland' and 'boring'. It's likely the child has been sneaking down to Caiyi town to have more extravagant meals.

"I checked with our ward team. When he goes days without eating, he doesn't make any trips to Caiyi town either."

Lan Qiren pauses and studies her. Lan Mingyun nods curtly, "When I first noticed this behavior, I immediately put him on my list." Her list of children with food-related issues, he assumes, "His eating habits are very erratic, erratic enough that I wish to assign one of our senior disciples to keep an eye on him."

"You're that worried?" Lan Xichen asks in surprise while Lan Qiren frowns. It isn't unusual to do so but he wonders if it is really necessary.

"As far as I know, the child lived on the streets for quite a few years," She says and Lan Qiren narrows his eyes, inwardly reprimanding himself. He had forgotten about that aspect of Wei Wuxian's history, "The link between early childhood trauma and behavioural problems are well known to us."

Lan Xichen frowns, "I'll ask Wangji to keep an eye on him."

He glances at his nephew sharply, "Why Wangji?" He demands because surely someone else would be better.

"From what I understand, Wei-gongzi will not welcome an assigned senior. He seems to be someone who brushes injuries or illnesses off. He likes Wangji and will be more willing to accept his company."

While the argument is reasonable, Lan Qiren is loath to involve his precious nephew in this. He's already so bothered by the boy.

But.

He thinks of Wei Wuxian with his sharp eyes and lingering smile and nods.

---

Wangji listens to Xichen patiently even as his fingers curl into fists under his sleeves.

He doesn't like Wei Wuxian. The boy is too disruptive, too bold, too distracting-

Too beautiful.

He doesn't like him, but that doesn't mean he's content to ignore his well-being. When Xichen asks him to keep an eye on Wei Ying's eating habits and general behavior, Wangji agrees.

It will be taxing for him, but he agrees.

What he doesn't anticipate is… everything that follows. When he starts consciously looking for them, the signs are alarming. Wei Ying doesn't just skip meals whenever he gets too distracted, he picks at the food even when he is eating. While Wangji is comforted to know the boy frequently seeks something richly flavored at Caiyi Town, he doesn't do it often enough to compensate.

There are also some concerning behaviors in the Jiang contingent. Upon closer inspection, it is clear that while Wei Ying does break the rules, the other Jiang Sect disciples are often complicit. Including Jiang Wanyin.

They not only let their da-shixiong take the blame for all of their actions, but also encourage it. Wei Ying seems disconcertingly accustomed to it. He makes a scene while being punished but seems alright within an hour.

Jiang Wanyin encourages mischief and reprimands him in turns.

Wangji doesn't understand this.

"Xiongzhang, I am concerned," Xichen looks up from his tea, his attention immediately on Wangji, unwavering and comforting, "Wei Ying," He takes a moment to form his thoughts, "I am uncertain. I believe he is in an unsafe environment."

Xichen sets his tea aside, "How so?"

"I happened upon a conversation," He grimaces because it is eavesdropping even if his intentions are noble, "Jiang Wanyin and Nie Huaisang requested and encouraged him to get alcohol into Cloud Recesses. When he complained about the punishment, Jiang Wanyin said 'at least, it wasn't Zidian'."

His brother sucks in a sharp breath, "Zidian? Madam Yu? Spiritual weapon? A high-grade weapon typically used against enemies?"

Wangji dips his head.

"I'll ask uncle to stop assigning corporal punishments." Lan Xichen says, "They won't have the desired effect in any case and we don't want to damage him permanently. Tomorrow, ask him to practice Cultivation in the Cold Pond as punishment."

Wangji nods, "I'll assign Jiang Wanyin and Nie Huaisang proper punishment as well."

"Wait until we have a better grasp on the situation." Xichen says solemnly, "If we act too quickly, things will escalate and may cause more harm to Wei-gongzi."

Wangji is reluctant because his sense of justice is not satisfied. He remembers how the Jiang disciples encouraged Wei Ying to accept punishment on their behalf. And then to know Jiang Wanyin was also complicit…

"We must approach this cautiously, Wangji."

He nods.

---

Red, irritated, scarred.

Wangji swallows as he sees the state of Wei Ying's back as the Jiang disciple steps into the Cold Pond. There are so many whip scars on his back, so many that have barely begun to heal, that he feels nauseous.

"Wei Ying," He struggles to keep his tone neutral, "Your back." He cannot imagine the agony that Wei Ying would've suffered when he took more punishment on it the other day.

Wei Ying glances at him and grins, "Aiya, Lan Zhan, is that concern I see on your pretty face?" He asks, spinning around eagerly, "Concern for little old me?"

His back is out of sight and the way Wei Wuxian is leaning towards him is meant to distract and fluster.

Wangji… suddenly understands. Wei Ying is naturally playful and mischievous, but he uses his personality for disguise and manipulation as well. Not maliciously, but in a way that harms him.

"Wei Ying," Wangji refuses to be moved. There is a significant shift in his mind. He no longer feels annoyed by the person before him. If anything, he feels furious.

He feels protective.

"Wei Ying, your back."

The Jiang disciple shrugs, "Punishment, you know how it is."

"For what?" He demands, catching Wei Ying's elbow and turning him around. The willingness to touch him stuns Wei Ying momentarily, enough for Wangji to get a good look at the brutal devastation written on Wei Ying's back.

Wei Ying clears his throat and shrugs, "It's more of a preemptive punishment? Madam Yu knew I would cause trouble here, of course." He chuckles.

"Preemptive punishment?" He asks softly, the very notion troubling him.

Wei Ying shrugs again but doesn't attempt to explain when it is clear Wangji isn't willing to indulge him.

"Wei Ying,"

"Lan Zhan," Wei Ying starts to move towards the shore, "Don't worry about things that don't concern you. Your head will forever be burdened if you do."

Wangji feels something in him recoil at such a blunt dismissal.

"Doesn't concern me? How can it not concern me?" He wants to ask but is unable to.

Wei Ying has made him very uncomfortable with his forward personality and near constant teasing, but Wangji has seen the genuine offer of friendship underneath it all.

He has always spurned it.

As Wei Ying climbs onto the shore, his wounds red against his naturally pale skin, Wangji makes a decision, "Would you not feel concerned if it were me?" He asks but he already knows the answer.

He already knows this man enough.

"Of course," Wei Ying says and shrugs on his robes, hiding a wince but unable to help his body's reaction to pain, "But you and I are different." He glances over his shoulder at Wangji, "I consider you my friend," He says, "But you don't consider me yours."

His breath stills at the acceptance in Wei Ying's tone.

"And that's alright." The Jiang disciple waves and walks away, "Don't worry too much, Lan Zhan. This one isn't weak. The wounds will heal within a few days."

---

"The facts are these - Wei-gongzi is punished preemptively with Zidian, often enough that there are deep scars on his back," Lan Xichen explains, "I assume it is his Golden Core keeping him from sustaining permanent damage."

Lan Qiren is still bristling at the very thought of preemptive punishment. What a ridiculous notion! Of course, the child doesn't care about rules and upsetting people! He has already been punished enough to excuse everything but outright treason.

How is such a method effective? How does it correct a child's misbehavior?

"The Jiang Sect disciples are accustomed to their da-shixiong being punished in their stead. They actively encourage it. Jiang Wanyin has asked Wei-gongzi to sneak in alcohol. And he refused to come forward when Wei-gongzi was punished." Xichen takes a deep breath, "I believe any lingering issues he may have because of his early days as a street orphan-"

"Are ignored," Lan Qiren concludes grimly, "It is no wonder the child has such strong cultivation. He is facing strife constantly."

"Is there a way to rescue him?" Wangji asks after being grimly silent for the entire meeting, "Get him away from the Jiang Sect?"

Lan Qiren eyes him, "Wangji, the situation is complicated. He's still the Jiang Head Disciple and sects don't just part with their high ranking disciples."

Xichen smiles sympathetically, "We'll find a way to pressure Jiang-zongzhu into taking action. He'll lose face if the other Sects know how his lady is treating their Head Disciple." He shakes his head at Wangji's expression, "Let us think about it. Meanwhile, you just need to be there for your friend, Wangji."

Lan Qiren arches a brow, "Friend? Wangji, I thought you disliked the boy."

Wangji purses his lips, a stubborn light entering his eyes, "Wei Ying is my friend." He insists, resolve lining his every word.

He looks at Xichen, who just looked amused, "According to Wei-gongzi, he considers Wangji a friend and will be very concerned if Wangji was in a similar situation," He huffs, "But Wangji doesn't consider Wei-gongzi his friend, so there's no need for Wangji to worry."

Lan Qiren closes his eyes and rubs his forehead in an uncharacteristic display of frustration, "That boy is a singular menace."

---

Wangji pursues friendship with all the dedication in his being. He learns to cook savory dishes and gives them to Wei Ying every day. Wei Ying, unable and utterly unwilling to deny, eats it all.

He glares the Jiang disciples into submission whenever they attempt to draw Wei Ying into mischief. The Jiang Head Disciple is fully exempt from corporal punishment. Instead, he spends hours in the library either copying rules, rewriting classics, or transcribing Buddhist texts.

All of these activities prove to be much more effective punishments.

Meanwhile, Lan Qiren attends a Discussion Conference and has word with Jiang Fengmian.

The response is a gentle order from the Jiang-zongzhu for Wei Ying. He asks his disciple to remain in Cloud Recesses for Musical Cultivation training. He also mentions it is time for Jiang Wanyin to take up Head Disciple responsibilities and learn true leadership.

Wei Ying eyes the smiling Lan Xichen and impassive Lan Qiren sharply but doesn't say anything.

In two years time, the distance between Wei Ying and the Jiang Sect grows. The distance between Wei Ying and Lan Zhan ceases to exist.

Just like that, Wei Wuxian's destiny changes.

#short prompts #wei wuxian #lan wangji #anti jiang sect #anti madam yu #anti jiang wanyin

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