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difeisheng · 4 months

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I need you all to know that Li Lianhua, Fang Duobing, and Di Feisheng had official Weibo accounts posting while MLC was airing, and there's too much to post it all here but some of these interactions are wonderful:

Li Lianhua: Today I wanted to go to the kitchen to cook, but it turns out Fang Xiaobao locked the kitchen doors?!

Di Feisheng: I've never eaten such unpalatable dishes in my life, @ Fang Duobing how did you survive before?

Fang Duobing (reply to DFS): Finally someone understands me

Li Lianhua (reply to FDB and DFS): I'm driving Lianhualou away, you two can sleep in the open tonight

Li Lianhua: I got woken up early this morning by Zhan Yunfei's sword practice, then dozed off again until now. Business is closed again today

Di Feisheng (reply to LLH): Who? Another person wants to duel with you? Make him line up behind me!

Li Lianhua: Let's celebrate tonight, I'll give the other two two extra dishes

Fang Duobing: Some people in the comments are saying Di Feisheng has been locked up by some Niuma Gang. What kind of gang is this and how have I not heard of it? How could Di Feisheng be so easily captured by a small gang?

Di Feisheng (reply to FDB): I can still hold out a little longer, come quickly you brat

If you want to scroll through these yourself, here's Li Lianhua's account, Fang Duobing's, and Di Feisheng's (it's not a great one but if you have the app, Weibo does have a translate function for posts which should give you the gist of some messages)

#ok yes i know 你小子 doesn't directly translate to 'brat' but i needed to get the energy across #god im cackling these are fun #i hope whoever was running the accounts had a good time #mysterious lotus casebook #liansanjiao #li xiangyi #fang duobing #di feisheng #ashton originals

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kingsandbastardz · 2 months

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here u go, ask for trying times: give me your pitch for shipping wudi, i've got maybe one foot on that ship but i'm curious on your thoughts (gl on the all-nighter!!)

I survived it, sorta. The deadlines keep trucking om 😭 So here's my thoughts:

It's really unfortunate that we don't see enough of Wuyan but I do think we have enough of a framework to draw some interesting conclusions about them both relationship-wise. So here's to me heavily analyzing the 5 minutes Wuyan is on screen! LMAO:

Service as show of devotion - Chooses to act like and appear as a lower rank personal servant to dfs even though he clearly has a lot of power to draw from to get things done and dfs tells him he sees his rank as being much higher

Of everyone that focuses their attention on dfs, he's the only one that doesn't want to own or control him (master di - slave, jlq - wife, llh - 主人, fdb - wants to be in charge)

Despite knowing he was massively outclassed, still put himself in lxy's path at donghai

Shared experience: both survived the Donghai battle together and both have matching chest scars courtesy of lxy. They also worked side by side for years to accomplish the same goals

Llh is presented as knowing dfs the best - but imo, that means wuyan knows even more. Wuyan knows all the why's that llh doesn't know

We don't see much general conversation but considering how relaxed dfs is around him and willing to winge about personal things - he seems like he's actually capable of communicating well with dfs lmao

Pure headcanon here, but I want to say he and dfs learned or figured out how to hide their chi at a high level together. DFS uses it all the time and seems to be undetectable even to llh - wuyan seems to be undetectable to the world - I mean i think his name means something like "without presence"? He comes pre-labelled. So I think it's something martial-skill related that would give additional meat to dfs' respect for him

Guards dfs' secrets - how dfs truly feels about all the mengzhu stuff and rankings etc. Don't know if he knows anything about Di Fortress, but anything he does know about dfs' background it's not going to be a topic of conversation

He pays attention to dfs' preferences and knows how to deliver them in the form he prefers (see jlq who doesn't know his preferences and hates that dfs doesn't like what she prepared for him)

As a personal guard, in the early days when dfs was weaker, he likely went with dfs to any secret meetings with llh, hid his chi to keep guard, and was privy to what went on between them. Likely is the only one that would know this information - which is also why he fully understands why dfs is obsessed with llh and supports him. And listened to him mourn him for however many years (I assume he's the one providing clean clothes and food during seclusion so that's 10 years of crying he's been privy to)

Is willing to extend his top level standard of service to the ppl dfs cares about

He acts like he's a nobody, and he's not a pretty face, but everything points to him actually being a very, very competent and high-level guy in his area of expertise? So a good match to dfs. His martial skill isn't comparable, so he can't fight him like lxy, but he can do all the things dfs doesn't like to do - like the organizational stuff, dealing with and managing ppl, etc.

Headcanon again: i can really see them having an experimental phase in their youth together. Like something where dfs and him kinda decide to test things out and then maybe deciding the timing was bad or they weren't into each other like that at that time or whatever. But deciding to remain friends instead. And continuing to build jinyuan alliance together and everything else. It's like best bro + work spouse rolled into one -- with the wild result that they come out even stronger at the end of it. Think lxy + zhan yunfei but they see each other and work together every day. Successfully. With some extra headcanon and a small stretch you can probably position him and dfs as foils to lxy and shan gudao? (Sadly not enough info about the formation of daily workings of JA back then)

headcanon continued: They have to have good communication because they negotiated or figured out how to navigate their Situation and have clearly been at it for awhile - with one being a 'servant' and with the other one having ptsd issues with servitude/slavery. In the waterfall scene we get to see dfs mildly checking in and essentially being all, "Uh, you still good there? Remember you can change things up any time you want. My opinion of you is still A++ fyi" and Wuyan essentially signalling he's fine by continuing on as always.

Wuyan is the last person alive that remembers who dfs was before Jinyuan Alliance and the development of the Di Mengzhu persona. He helped craft that persona.

Basically if you are into themes like fealty and devotion and the sort of comfort you can get from a long time friendship where they've seen each other at their worst. Where they've figured out how to communicate and operate/exist together seamlessly while making allowances for each others' needs and interests. This is it!

They could be queer platonic, they could be sexual, they can be any permutations of anything and it still doesn't change the basis of their relationship which is years of trust, communication, hard work and shared experiences.

Like imagine teenagers - one holding the other guy's hair up while he vomits blood and bile into an alley. Where they patch each others' wounds in the shadow of someone's doorway after getting their asses kicked but somehow also saving each other from getting killed that day. They're the ones that figure out how to kill together. How to hide together. They figure out how to teach others to kill and hide together. They build power with their joined hands and with it they gain the money and prestige that allows them a comfortable place to sleep and full bellies. They give this same thing to others. They build it up so well people can afford to do normal ppl shit like fall in love and get married.

These are things they likely wouldn't have thought of when they were engaged in a battle royale in the street. It's them, their circle of friends, against everyone else in the world. And even when all their friends are now dead - they're still alive. They're still together. They'll see it through.

Maybe one day they'll find their way into each other's beds - the future is ever changing. But whether they do or not doesn't matter - they already have each other. They've survived this much together. Anything else is just icing.

#tbh this is also one of the reasons the ot3 keeps trying to morph into an ot4 or an ot3 + 1 bc I just can't remove wuyan without killing him #imagine llh-with-control-needs with access to someone like wuyan who willingly swaps in because dfs' ptsd creates hard boundaries?#im not even talking sexually - both llh and fdb have Upper Class Needs in their blood (tho llh tries to deny it)#does c-fandom have a name for this ship? I went with wudi bc it sounds like judi from atla - with the 'there is nothing here' hypnotism #get it? wuyan? judi? no presence + kungfu jedi mind tricks? aahahahaha. eeeeh.#mysterious lotus casebook #di feisheng #wuyan #wudi #my royal ramblings #meta #all nighter meta replies #replies

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gingersnapwolves · 3 months

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Final thoughts on Mysterious Lotus Casebook~

Things I loved:

The main characters! Fang Xiaobao for character of all time. Who’s doing it like him? That ponytail should win an award for best supporting actor. Li Lianhua is obviously incredible but I’m going to hold a grudge against him for making Xiaobao sad. Di Feisheng was unexpectedly hilarious. Man comes out of a ten year recovery period and his first words are ‘I need a rematch’.

The minor characters! Princess Xiaoling was amazing. Yang Yunchun constantly simping for Shi from Baichuan court was hilarious. Shoutout to Murong Yao for being super hot. Qiao Wanmian for queen of everything.

The villains (mostly)! Shan Gudao and Xiao Zijin being parallels because nobody was comparing you to Li Xiangyi except you (but it’s still so understandable that they would be so envious even as it doesn’t excuse their actions)! Shan Gudao not actually being secret royalty! Local man needs to just get a grip (but won’t)!

The themes! Dealing with grief and loss! Finding closure! Learning to live after a tragedy! Great job everyone, hit the showers.

The hurt/comfort! Enough said.

The wonderful trope I will choose every time: you don’t have to go along with your biological family when they’re toxic as fuck! I kept waiting for Xiaobao to be like ‘but he’s my real father, I have to do what he wants!’ but every single time Xiaobao was just like ‘wow fuck that guy, I’ve got parents who raised me and who love me and that dude fuckin’ sucks’. 1000000/10, no notes.

Things I did not love as much:

Although I don’t think JLQ is supposed to be particularly relatable, her whole motivation was like. Lady. He’s just not into you. Get a grip. Got very annoying by the end.

Most mystery shows, I like to try to solve things as clues are revealed and that was just not possible in this show. It felt like every single case ended with LLH giving a five minute monologue on stuff that there was no possible way the audience could have known, but he personally had figured out. I could barely track it even while he explained it. I’m still not sure who murdered Jin Mantang. Don’t get me wrong, the cases were fun and interesting, but Agatha Christie, they weren’t. Especially egregious towards the end, what with Li ‘I’ve deduced the entire imperial line is illegitimate based on two seconds looking at this mural which the audience hasn’t even seen’ Lianhua.

The ending didn’t thrill me. Like, it’s sad but you see it coming so you can kind of make peace with it. I even get why LLH wouldn’t let FDB even try to save him, because he didn’t want FDB to feel like he failed. But in that case, why the ambiguity? Couldn’t he have gone to his master’s grave and let them find his body or something? Just feels very rude lol.

tl;dr solid show and a lot of fun, definitely enjoyed it but don’t feel it rewiring my brain lol

#just rambling #mysterious lotus casebook

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seventh-fantasy · 6 months

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"#their rs is only as equal as he decides it to be" hits the nail on the HEAD for me THANK you. llh and fdb are friends the way parents and children can be friends. fdb makes a very commendable effort at being equals with llh and llh can allow and enjoy it to an extent but there IS a gap. fdb not having access to llh's past puts him in a unique position to understand llh in a way that nobody else does and that IS good for llh, like fresh eyes on such a worn out painful story. but there's also an element of responsibility that llh has for fdb that he doesn't have for dfs. dfs is his equal and can make his own life choices. he only escaped dfs at the end because of dfs's own choice to trust him with the flower, not anything llh could have done. but he can still escape fdb on his own power just fine. ANYWAY EVERY RELATIONSHIP IN THIS SHOW IS KILLING ME IN UNIQUE AND SPECIFIC WAYS thank u for understanding

(for context)

NO THANK YOU for understanding!!!! I didn't even think anyone was going to read [inserts opinion that I think could get me into a situation surrounded by knives] as you can tell I hid it deep in the tags of reblogs of my own non-maintagged post hbhjbhjbhjbj - and even much less agree with something of it

hell yeah. to me their relationship is entirely premised on that gap between them, for better and for worse. that's how fdb can be unique to him but at the same time also puts him out of fdb's reach forever (that's why ep 30 hits hard). it's very likely llh wouldn't have continued with their relationship - at least with the degree of investment he did - if not for finding out his connection to sgd. so the familial element in it is virtually inseparable from the manner they ended up to be with each other. (like also, on top of how how lxy was literally a formative "adult" figure to bb fdb.)

while fdb thinks this is a friendship the whole time, llh actually treats fdb like a younger family member 小辈, with the front of being friends bc he was a Liar hiding his identity. and then post-identity reveal was bc he's just a Liar who doesn't feel the need to load his own problems on a younger member as an elder. (I do think this mismatched perceptions of their relationship is delicious)

also that's such a good add-on regarding dihua's relationship - particularly about the element of trust between them, which is a basis to why I can consider them friends in some dimension even back when they were more of rivals, unlike fdb with llh. like llh/fdb, they contain a paradox: being the ones who understand each other better than anyone else can but also bc they're so up close on each other that they fail to really see each other too. they're equals premised on the circumstance of them being from the same generation with a shared past (that is also part of their tragedy), but also, in a very curious space of it not being entirely mutual - simply due to llh being the person he is with the kind of conflict he's facing. (once again, all the relationships llh have are embedded with a degree of them being unrequited and it's <333 </333)

THEY REALLY ARE KILLING ME TOO IN THE BEST WAY POSSIBLE YEAH

#(also then all that makes difang infinitely infinitely fascinating <3 sorry i am a difang truther)#asks #wonderfulnonsense #lhl #lhlmeta #dihua #this is why i still post insane takes nobody prob cares about somehow hoping there may be just 1 or 2 people who would perhaps get it #anw i need more ppl to talk about this show with thank u #literally before i received this ask i was considering if i shld do a proper post talking about this #bc i made some connections/observations i think might be interesting and important to myself to talk about #but i cannot say i don't have a Fear in me about posting them #for a long time i thought i didn't care for fh bc of how the fandom likes it =/= not how i care for it.#but by now i know exactly how i need to read them in order to enjoy them

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blobofcolour · 8 months

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Finally finished watching Mysterious Lotus Casebook.

It's a good wuxia drama in itself and as someone who has read the novel, the drama also managed to bring out the spirit of the novel who is the man himself Li Lian Hua and his long goodbye to jianghu. Because he once shone so brightly and proudly, it was incomprehensible to those that love and hate him that he would be content with not having it all, even to the point of death.

I really feel for LLH because those around him - from friends to enemies! - insist on seeing him as Li Xiang Yi and continues to put their expectations of LXY on him. LLH keeps repeating himself over and over, but ultimately it seemed that only Zhan Yunfei truly understood and accepted Li Lian Hua.

有些人弃剑如遗有些人终身不负人的信念终是有不同的

LLH's tragedy is not in his death, but in those around him refusing to understand that we have different paths in life and choosing one over the other at different points in your life is perfectly fine.

If ZYF represented acceptance of LLH's choices, then Fang Duo Bing is the ultimate manifestation of rejection of LLH's wishes. I was SO frustrated with him throughout the drama arggg. While I can't recall how FDB was exactly like in the novel, he was definitely not like the drama and I have no idea what possessed the scriptwriter to turn him into this sulky, needy young girlfriend to LLH. Couldn't they have just gone for the master/student dynamic minus the neediness? I want to tear my hair out every time FDB professes to be LLH's 知己 zhi ji … hold up, I don't think you know the meaning of the words you are saying. Student yes, friend maybe, but zhi ji you are most definitely not. I find FDB constantly demanding LLH behave a certain way because a) FDB determines it's the 'correct' way b) LLH should reciprocate the friendship the way FDB wants.

Heck, even FDB's mom has a better understanding of LLH as evidenced by what she told him before LLH left for the palace. I mean, I get it, FDB is much younger and sees the world in a black and white manner. But still, even to the last freaking episode after everything that he has seen LLH gone through, he was like noooo, you stay here, I will find the antidote, I will cure you blah blah blah. Sure it's human nature to want your loved ones to not-die, but if FDB had even bothered really to hear LLH out and try to accept LLH's choices, I would have been less annoyed with him.

Like what kind of reasoning is this??? 拜托不要再情勒！ Why does LLH owe FDB or anyone for that matter to stay alive? Look, LLH is not actively looking to off himself but he has made peace with himself/his impending demise over the last 10 years. The world wouldn't let go of LXY and let LLH have his peace.

#mysterious lotus casebook #莲花楼 #cdrama #cheng yi #成毅 #cdrama thoughts

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angryteapott · 9 months

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Okay, someone else posted so it got me thinking but one of the reasons I hate the reveal that li lianhua is ~secretly royalty~ and more importantly that shan gudao was a regular guy is because of happy's death. To sum up:

Happy is actually the reason i got so into the show, because without him the first few arcs would feel very flat. There's a bunch of little moments that show happy's interiority, and a bunch of little moments that show fang duobing blithely not getting it. My favorite of these moments is when fang duobing snatches a letter with happy's fathers handwriting as evidence. He'd intended to burn it at his mother's grave.

This is an interesting writing choice! It sets up our hyper privileged protagonist not really caring about non privileged people. It works nicely with Li Xiangyi's past being that he was a beggar. We also get a bit of that sort of backstory with di feisheng, but it doesn't really have a regular people vibe so it doesn't fit into this theme of this inherent conflict of who's important and who isn't.

And for the first few cases this is very important! Happy's death makes Fang Duobing seek vengeance for him, and he seeks justice for the guards as well while learning it was really the rich who vented their anger about their own selfish mistreatment of a loved one. Very much dual themes of who is justice for (fang duobing's arc) and people who were treated badly by the people who were supposed to love them. Yeah they got justice for the guards by... killing their enslaved colleagues... but fight scenes are a must I guess. This also is interesting in the context of Li Xiangyi founding Baichuan Court, a mechanism for justice (it's a cop show, I know, I know). This is the moment I think Li Lianhua first really notices Fang Duobing.

Then they never. Mention. Happy. Again.

Sputteringly, the themes are continued! Qiao Wanmian intentionally lets go of people related to the jinyuan alliance instead of assuming they're guilty by association. The lotus mansion arc's first victim is a redeemed courtesan with few choices and the girls of girl manor are treated sympathetically. Zijin is shown as evil both because he's jealous but also because he's shallow and obsessed with power instead of justice. There's a throwaway line that Sigu Sect should search for a merchant the same way as they do for Li Xiangyi. An important moment revealing that Fang Duobing sees Li Xiangyi as more than just his status is him understanding that the Sigu Sect should be about justice, combining neatly with Xiangyi's previous status as a beggar that people say he should be so embarrassed of he would kill Shan Gudao about it. But never is there a case with the same justice is for everyone thrust. The villains become determined by their ethnicity with a few one off 'greedy' characters. What is the point of the king of hell arc, other than to be background as LLH and FDB divorce? By the time we see Li-er again, Happy's erstwhile friend, the show is wrapped up enough in the main plot that it doesn't really notice that Fang Duobing tried to send Li-er for a blanket when the mansion is under attack in place of his mother when he says out loud he never thought his mother was in any real danger. The villains were people with birth defects mad about being treated as disposable who killed women to (reads notes) detoxify poison that actual emerald would work for that they never figured out how to identify from a local after ten years.

Then the main plot is revealed- Shan Gudao! Thematically, Shan Gudao is a villain because he was always jealous of Li Xiangyi, but he clings to shallow things like bloodline making him matter in the face of his trauma.

By this time in my least favorite way of upping the stakes not even Li Lianhua cares about the little people anymore, only about the "peace of the world" maintained by an emperor who was going to build an expensive pagoda for fertility issues, presumably at the expense of the people. Before we even get to the horrible no good reveal it's shown that Shan Gudao was treated as less than by his adults because his parents didn't have a relationship with them. He's evil because he was mad about it, not because his anger was misdirected. Then they reveal that all along good guy Li Xiangyi was the royal bloodline and the emperor and Shan Gudao are not.

Do you see. How far we've come. From a theme of you shouldn't ignore the lives of those of the lower class. Our fascinating justice seeking protagonist is secretly royalty, oooh. I guess it could be a play that these things are shallow and arbitrary, but it's a) actually important to the plot that he is for his literal actual blood and b) so far removed from the nuance of the first few cases it feels baffling to rewatch them. I hate it! I hate it so much! Instead of learning the explicitly stated lesson of the first few cases that things shouldn't be about shallow markers of power it should be about justice for everyone it turns into Fang Duobing learning Tianji Manor servants sure are useful as cannon fodder, no need to learn any of their names, oh my boyfriend is the most important interesting man on earth. Literally the end of the Fang Duobing Happy dichotomy is oh we forgot we did that. It's not even that they said the theme i liked was wrong it's that they said forget about that theme it's too complicated and low stakes really people just get too jealous of special people and the "world" is at risk ie the emperor and not anyone else. Which if they set that up as how things are or interrogate it and end up there I'll argue with it, but I won't call the writing just based on that. Here...

I really do love the characters and their relationships, but in terms of themes they dropped the ball so badly I'm having issues with the characterization

#mysterious lotus casebook #mysterious lotus casebook spoilers

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seventh-fantasy · 5 months

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I already adore fdb/princess zhaoling since the first watch but I've only gotten around to thinking about them a lot more lately. for reasons.

they have unmatched compatibility because they're essentially very similar people, you know, in a world surrounded by everyone else more experienced and different from them. two sheltered and privileged, initially naive kids who yearn / enjoy freedom and dares to seek out for it. (though zhaoling pursues after that lifestyle less actively than fdb.) and they are both very loved and protected by the adult figures they met outside of the mainstream system they were born into. as a sign of defiance, zhaoling submits the chicken feet, which fdb chose over any other conventional option -- was their moment of connection to each other, even unbeknownst to themselves.

it struck me that in their first interactions with each other, zhaoling as qing'er was seen frequently serving fdb - practically emulating traditional husband and wife roles. in the same patriarchal microcosm of girls mansion, fdb played the husbandly role with a duty to protect his wife - in fact he was the only person who had the power to do so while she wasn't allowed to fend for herself. this power dynamics switches over completely when zhaoling was revealed to be the princess, fdb becomes totally reserved around her and puts himself beneath her while she, the only person with the power to save everyone else.

however, in between those two points in their relationship, zhaoling was able to reveal her true personality while he acted comfortably with her. in their private moments at girls mansion, she commanded fdb around - he heeds obediently but still felt comfortable enough to voice his opinions to zhaoling. she was possibly the only person who could match up to fdb's 本少爷 young master attitude, while also being the one who can fully admire his qualities without any other considerations. they were able to play off each other freely - and this is most likely how the both of them would have interacted with each other as individuals without any inhibitions of the social roles/identities they were tied to. at their most comfortable with each other.

(the twist in) their ending in the show is hopeful but their fate is as unknown as the ending of anybody else in this show. just as what fdb said to princess, "who is to know now what will happen in the future?"

I love that zhaoling respected his will and that we were given an open reading. but at the same time, any thought of their possible fate beyond this point can't help but be coloured in tragic tones more than not:

over the course of the story after the girl's mansion arc, their dynamics gradually levels again, but I am not sure if it ever managed to revert to the aforementioned ideal state of their private moments together in girl's mansion.

the wait is indefinite. what would be "enough" for fdb? can you really get enough of jianghu? how long is it going to be?

if they wanted to be with each other at all, there is still sort of an expectation that he was to come back to her (not her to him) - the problem not being her as a person, but that being with her came with being married to the imperial court. to marry the princess means they do not simply become husband and wife, but will also become ruler-subject. and the latter would be the greatest tragedy to happen to their relationship as two equals who are able to connect to each other in their understanding of the world.

their true fate together largely depends on who fdb would become after llh is gone. if their ending pointed to something hopeful but uncertain after their last scene together, now in llh's absence, it's even more of a mystery. regardless, what stands between them is jianghu and time - and what is the jianghu fdb is going after now? after fdb went through the redefinition of jianghu once (losing lxy - between finding out llh was lxy, and cutting ties from bcy for the sake of llh) and then once again (losing llh in the ending)?

there is simply no way of knowing for sure for the audience. in the same way, there will no known answer to what happens to fdb and zhaoling. anything is possible. here's another take:

given the person fdb is, it is hard to imagine fdb making empty promises to zhaoling if he felt nothing for her - or despite knowing it will entail with him entering the imperial court aka the last thing he wanted in the world.

I'm inclined to think, even if he fulfills his promise to princess, it will be because fdb has broken the cycle of grief and learnt to deal with it. rather than as a reluctant compromise.

he was supposed to be most like his shifu lxy/llh, according to lxy/llh himself. llh has lived that life of becoming liberated in his own terms. if fdb had truly inherited the life lessons llh was imparting to him (not the martial abilities and techniques), then fdb would be capable of going on to liberate himself and become the person most like his shifu. and he will be a contrast to dfs being the one trapped in grief. (thus also making dfs's place in fdb's potential post-canon life so significant and compelling.) he symbolises the future, the hope of the new generation who has been guided and nurtured by the love of his predecessors.

of course notwithstanding that there is a more sinister reality to the imperial court realm, I would still like to explore a more positive possibility. even though agreeing to the imperial engagement appears to be a submission to the system he was initially intent on rebelling against, I would like to think that growth in fdb would look like acceptance and making life in his own terms within the given parameters - like what llh had made for himself in the first year of becoming llh. it's no longer about taking extreme measures (constantly running away) but an act of balancing and harmonisation. (-> my hypothesis that if lxy is yin, dfs is yang then fdb would be yin-yang)

marrying zhaoling would be for who she is rather than the system she stood for. or if there could be another way, like her leaving to be with him - I'm not sure. but what I know is. in a post-llh world, the people he loves (eg. zhaoling, papa and mama fang) live in the realm of secular, mainstream society (while also not quite - but they're definitely not part of wulin jianghu either). after all, jianghu will cease to be jianghu if the people he loves are no longer in it.

#莲花楼 #mysterious lotus casebook #lhlmeta #lhl #my posts #this is my crazed 'this is how fdb/zhaoling can work' ted talk #for the ppl who get what i'm talking about ok <3 #just in case you're wondering if nothing makes sense. yes i may not even know what i'm saying but. just know it makes sense #also anything i discuss of post-canon will be inherently embedded with a difang agenda. even when i'm not diving into it #bc thats how it is babyy <3 #公主病 #(rent-lowering gunshots)

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kingsandbastardz · 1 month

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Writing Patterns

Thank you to @mx-myth!

This is supposed to be first sentence of my last 10 AO3 works.

But I'm modifying like... everything lol - I play with format with my writing and one thing I definitely do a lot is quote lines from the canon, so I'm going to be putting first few sentences/paragraph/sequence to work past those and for consistency. And like @mx-myth I'll also be adding a few last sentences for the few published works I have, just for fun. I'm including wips because I don't have a large body work. For WIP it'll be first sentence only. lmao is this the same tag challenge at all?

01. SAMSARA ( wip - Mysterious Lotus Casebook: FangDi - with past DiHuaDi - transmigration rebirth modern AU with a deeply traumatized actor Di Feisheng trying to both rescue this world's version of LLH while also running away from him and FDB with all his might.)

Imagine this: you live, you kill, you lick dirt from the shoes of your masters. You fail to die so many times you begin to wonder if you're immortal.

02. everything looks small - we gave up on those happy endings (wip MLC - This is the story I've been torturing myself with the past 2 months: Trio + Wuyan and a random Hulijing)

"Do you not remember me at all? Does the name Di Feisheng mean anything to you?" Li Lianhua smiles as he gathers his winnings. "Of course I remember you. You're my kind and rich friend." But that can't be right, Fang Duobing thinks as Li Lianhua tells him about his recently made acquaintance over dinner, his sightless eyes shining with a familiar brightness - just for a moment. That can't be right, because Di Feisheng has been missing for months.

03. 囍 Marriage (wip MLC - There are a lot of dead brides and ruined marriages in this series so I'm continuing the tradition. fanghua with possible difanghua and difanghuajlq. Sorta.)

He wakes choking, clawing free from the ropes binding his wrists to press trembling fingers to agonized lips that are sewn shut with some kind of fine thread. There is a golden ingot trapped behind his teeth, stretching his jaw open against strained stitching. He chokes as he struggles to breathe through his nose and the lump of metal presses against the back of his tongue to slip further against his throat. He's terrified the blackness means he's also been blinded.

04. flight is something done willfully (wip MLC - fangdi, immediately post-canon - something something about having to finally deal with fdb's trauma surrounding loss and abandonment and dfs having a fuckton of patience in dealing with fdb's prolonged panic attack that mobilizes a small militias, the Minister of the Treasury, and sigu sect leadership)

You made the mistake of thinking words would finally be acceptable. After all, you are now free. A potential cure for poison has been handed over. All is well. You can relax and open your mouth and actually let real words come out. But the thing is, your tacit understanding only lasts as long as neither of you try to actually communicate.

05. The Universe of Us : When you lose a person, a whole universe goes along with them (wip MLC - timeloop and a battle between opposing spirits)

When Fang Duobing and Di Feisheng meet again, it is at the same time, on the same beach where they find nothing but the ocean, a pile of fermenting seaweed and their own memories. They are like strangers absorbed in their own grief. It's no matter. To Di Feisheng, they met because of Li Lianhua, so it’s fitting that they are both strangers now without him.

06. 羽化成蝶 Metamorphosis (DFS' core is untouchable - idk where I'm going with this but the main concept is internal vs external form)

A familiar dao thumps onto the table as a handsomely dressed giantess seats herself across from Li Xiangyi. "I have the list," she says with no introduction. Her voice is low and fuzzy, like someone who's spent a lifetime with a pipe in hand and smoke in her lungs - it wasn't unpleasant. "Di-mengzhu," Li Xiangyi greets politely as he pours her tea. A faint wildness in his eyes is his only acknowledgement that he is facing something unexpected.

07. Pear Blossoms In Spring ( wip - Mysterious Lotus Casebook: FangDi - meant to be a silly romance but turned into a comedy about a shaoye who keeps comparing the love of his life to his favorite dead horse)

“Ah, this is the Iron Head Slave. Remember?” says Li Lianhua the Lying Liar gesturing to the tall, leggy beauty blocking their path. “His name is a-Fei.”

08. the moon is as bright as it was before (my first finished and posted fic in many years and it's an experimental thought piece for Mysterious Lotus Casebook)

the existence of a torture chamber beside the wedding bedroom and its contents shouldn’t be a surprise at this point. and yet… it’s the redundancy you find offensive. she has a multi-chamber dungeon. she has a water chamber in her own quarters. why must it extend here as well?

under the moon’s blessing, you smile back and for the first time in your life, you hope for the future.

09. I, Augustus (Tour Of the Merrimack - gay space roman that can't decide whether he wants to kill or fuck an american and which is worse? who knows)

It was sound that went first. Eardrums deadened, he careened off the bridge, chest so full of metal he'd lost count how many times he'd been shot. He could see the flash-bang of incendiary rounds as they were fired from both his fellow 300 and the advancing Americans, the light momentarily coloring roiling black smoke with flashes of pink and yellow.

He dreams instead of possibility, of new worlds and unmappable futures, their patterns varied and far reaching as the ever expanding universe.

10. An Affair to Remember: The Commissar and His Snake (Warhammer 40k fandom - A Guant's Ghosts story in the style of Ciaphas Cain)

opening

INQUISITORIAL DOSSIER: IIIX:4SE:A3ASF3S:XXX COMPILED BY INTERROGATOR ANTONIUS WONG CHAU-SANG UNDER THE AUSPICES OF INQUISITOR MABODABU, ORDO XENOS INQUISITORIAL DATA-LIBRARY DATE: 999.M41 FILE START// Editorial note: I am sure that most who read this are already familiar with the work of the esteemed Inquisitor Amberley Vail who compiled her eye-opening series based upon the famed Commissar Cain's private memoirs.

ending

“Come along then,” I said as I began to walk. I lengthened my stride. My legs are, after all, longer.43 I felt Elim follow, his dark presence hesitating only a moment before he was half a step behind me, where he should be, sure and certain as any shadow. 43 I can only assume Colonel-Commissar Gaunt deliberately lengthened his stride to make it more difficult for the Major to keep up. This would be an ongoing theme in their relationship for many years to come.

Patterns:

For openings, whether it's with concept or actions/visual, I tend to drop the reader straight into the middle of a situation as a hook and then dial it backwards.

I favor punchy openings.

also like I said earlier, I like to quote or recreate a scene from the canon to quickly establish tone and position in the story

of the 3 endings I have here, all of them tend to be like the ending of a jdrama where it fades off toward a "and life goes on" vibe, rather than something stronger like "and then this happened". I don't forsee this changing much in the future. I tend to fade away by the time i reach an ending so either it's super abrupt or the wheel of life continues turning~~~

Tagging all writers and anyone else who wants to do this!

@the-wintry-mizzenmast @momosandlemonsoda @thesilversun @randomingoftherandomness @eirenical @difeisheng @busarewski @bbcphile

#tag game #mysterious lotus casebook #writing patterns #my royal ramblings

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