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smittenskitten · 3 months

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You know it's true love when they get gay married to their enemy (the love of their life) because of imperial edict

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veliseraptor · 2 years

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a thing I really enjoy about the untamed/mdzs is that literally no one is well adjusted. no one is okay. they're all severely emotionally damaged and failing to cope.*

with the possible exception of jin guangshan who could be coping a little worse imo

#the sad queer cultivators show #this is in fact a feature of all of mxtx's work i think #and possibly cnovels in general #everyone very dysfunctional all of the time! made for me #important text posts #i'm going to try to channel this frenetic energy into something useful

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gender-trash · 1 year

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impulse bought a new cnovel the other day and today book 1 finally arrived! im excited to find out who the shippable twinks are in Romance of the Three Kingdoms

#the trashcan speaks #i love describing ‘legit’ literature as cnovels. there is nothing funnier #‘is water margin a danmei?’ greatest thread in history of forums; locked by mods etc etc #also the book arrived with a hole punched in the back cover and last 15ish pages #im sort of annoyed but all the text is still readable so like realistically am i going to return it? no. am i a little mad? yeah :/

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verycharismaticdragon · 1 year

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i found this textpost saved in my jianghu name da folder and realized we have good quality official art now so this was the only thing i could do

#jianghu name da #zhu yanyin #li sui #suiyin #yu xiao lan shan #danmei novels #江湖那么大 #jianghu is so great #the jianghu is boundless #语笑阑珊 #text post meme #cnovels

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stellarish · 10 months

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Jinping's most notorious wastrel (and his new half-puppet) have arrived at the Latent Cultivation Temple!

Closeups under the cut :D

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corpiote · 26 days

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looking at my reading list from years ago and realizing

1. I don't rmbr what most of these stand for now and 2. only devil venerable has changed spots since I deleted twt

where did all my motivation go😭 cybird

seriously what is ybpqvw??

#fgep i am so srry i forgot abt u but i started reading gl manhua/manhwa instead of baihe #text #danmei #cnovels

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spockandawe · 7 months

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Mo Dao Zu Shi!!!!!

Ahahaha, what can i say that i haven't said before? Actually, I'm not certain I've explicitly stated that I'm determined to make myself lavish single-volume editions of all my most favorite cnovels with lavish edge decorations, and mdzs has been a notable hole in my collection (my collection of two, lmao. and svsss deserves an edition with more extravagant decorations). So here we are!

I've adored this set of illustrations since i saw them, years ago, and i finally got ambitious enough with my pens to try to go for it. It was.... a lot of work. A lot. But it turned out so well I can't even be mad at myself! I wanted to get a good pair of thematic images, without having to draw too many faces at such low resolution (did i properly consider all those background lans and corpses? I did Not). These were high drama and a good pairing for the characters being at their stubbornest, lowest point. Never again! But I'm glad i did it XD

What else. This typesetting came in at 1360 pages, small text but very comfortable for my eyes. It's rounded and backed (probably the outside limit of what i want to round and back in a quarto book, honestly), and it has chiyogami endpapers and leather endbands. This time, i chose a contrasting shade from the spine leather and honestly LOVE the effect, I'll probably do it again.

This was a lot, but again, i absolutely love it! It might get a box soon, but i don't have plans now, so I'll post this as is and add to it if needed :D

#the grandmaster of demonic cultivation #mo dao zu shi #mdzs #crafts #bookbinding #edge painting #*penning #im not a painter but i AM a drawer!#long post

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karmiya · 10 months

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I actually do a lot of research and am collecting what may one day be an entire bookshelf's worth of reference books, so I thought I'd share one. This is my pride and joy, at least as far as research goes:

To Live as Long as Heaven and Earth is a translation of the Shenxian Zhuan, a series of biographies of Daoist immortals by Ge Hong. The (extensive) introduction by Professor Campany also includes a lot of the translator's own research, drawing on various sources in order to provide a good overview of practices attributed to Daoists in common folklore. If you're interested in the Xianxia and Wuxia genres and their origins, I think this is an invaluable English-language text. Its focus is entirely on traditional beliefs, but through it you can see just how much of the modern fantasy genre in China is based entirely on traditional folklore.

The images of talismans, for example, are extremely familiar to any viewers of modern fantasy dramas or donghua. These look very similar to the talismans we see in the Modao Zushi donghua, don't they?

This is a really interesting little section describing levels of ascendance. It's a lot simpler than modern novels with their million stages of core formation, isn't it? (Though, to be fair, most novels I read are by authors who don't care to get into that level of detail and focus on characters and storytelling, thank goodness!) The 'tianxian' sound a bit like heavenly officials in more recent stories, don't they, whereas the dixian are regular immortal cultivators who still live on earth. The use of shijie (corpse simulacrums) meanwhile, seems to mainly be maintained as a means of faking one's death, not as a means of escaping the notice of the officials of the underworld!

The main paths of immortality outlined in Ge Hong's work are: internal cultivation, external cultivation (alchemy), the arts of the bedchamber, and diet. The first three are very familiar, but I've noticed that diet-based cultivation shows up much more rarely in modern stories. I can only immediately think of Ye Baiyi from Word of Honour, who begins to age again after descending from the mountains and imbibing mortal food once more.

One thing I found interesting is that most accounts of immortals flying either depict them doing so under their own power, or placing a talisman within a bamboo staff and flying on that (or sending some poor soul on a sudden trip across the country!). Flying swords seem to be a much more modern convention.

One thing that's really amusing to me is how much energy the author (Ge Hong, not the translator) dedicated to poking fun at Confucius and Confucianism. Even though the three major religions eventually became known as the Three Teachings and are in modern terms viewed as very harmonious and complementary, historically there was often a huge amount of religious tension. Confucians and Daoists bickered with each other a lot, and then Buddhists got into the fray as well as Buddhism became more and more popular in East Asia. While Buddhism was present in China in Ge Hong's time, it had yet to reach its later popularity; this is probably why Buddhism is barely mentioned in Ge Hong's writing. There are a few indirect references and borrowings from Buddhist tales, and Professor Campany posits that some were intentionally used in competition with Buddhism, while others may have been added by later compilers/transcribers of the text who were Buddhists themselves.

A lot of Cnovels depict this sort of religious tension (Thousand Autumns is a good example), and it's really interesting to see that in these translated historical texts. Even though there are plenty of texts I can't get access to and/or wouldn't be able to read in the original language, there is a huge amount of English-language and translated scholarship on Chinese history available. A lot of it is fascinating to read from a perspective of a fan of Chinese fantasy, since the genre draws so heavily on real history and folklore.

#xianxia #wuxia #chinese fantasy #history research

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tavina-writes · 1 year

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LXC would've gotten disbarred

After I kind of drifted away from the cnovel translation forum I used to be a part of, like, a decade ago, I thought to myself: my translator days are over! I will not translate stuff again! The post about if NMJ has hobbies (found here if you want to see it) was merely a blip on the radar of “not translating anything.”

Alas, I appear to have descended into a new pit, and that is seeing things in the other translations of mdzs and going back to the Chinese to look at things, discussing with @autumnslantern and just, translating snippets of this book and then deciding to share the results.

In this case, it’s a passage from Chapter 73, which is doing the rounds again, but I’ve most commonly seen as evidence for “LXC really wanted to say something about the treatment of the Wens but got steamrolled by NMJ’s objections” and I kind of just want to wave at the title of this post because if Chinese Novel!Xichen had been my defense lawyer, I would fire him. I would want him disbarred lol. I love him but this was not a shiny moment of Xichen getting steamrolled.

Again, this appears like it will get long, so meta under the cut:

The passage in question in this one, which is early on in Chapter 73:

The fantranslation I have access to says this:

Lan XiChen responded a moment later, “I have heard of Wen Qing’s name a few times. I do not remember her having participated in any of the Sunshot Campaign’s crimes.”

Nie MingJue, “But she’s never stopped them either.”

Lan XiChen, “Wen Qing was one of Wen RuoHan’s most trusted people. How could she have stopped them?”

Nie MingJue spoke coldly, “If she responded with only silence and not opposition when the Wen Sect was causing mayhem, it’s the same as indifference. She shouldn’t have been so disillusioned as to hope that she could be treated with respect when the Wen Sect was doing evil and be unwilling to suffer the consequences and pay the price when the Wen Sect was wiped out.”

Lan XiChen knew that because of what happened to his father, Nie MingJue abhorred Wen-dogs more than anything, especially with how intolerable he was toward evil. Lan XiChen didn’t say anything else.

One of the sect leaders spoke up, “What Sect Leader Nie said is quite right. Besides, Wen Qing is one of Wen RuoHan’s most trusted people. You’re telling me she never participated? Well I don’t buy it. Is there any Wen-dog without a single drop of blood on their hands? Maybe it’s just that we haven’t found out about it yet!”

The Chinese text that these passages correspond to is this:

蓝曦臣沉吟道：“这位温情的大名我知晓几分，似乎没听说她参与过射日之征中任何一场凶案的。”

聂明玦道：“可她也没有阻拦过。”

蓝曦臣道：“温情是温若寒的亲信之一，如何能阻拦？”

聂明玦冷冷地道：“既然在温氏作恶时只是沉默而不反对，那就等同于袖手旁观。总不能妄想只在温氏兴风作浪时享受优待，温氏覆灭了就不肯承担苦果付出代价。”

蓝曦臣知道，因家仇之故，对温狗聂明玦是最为痛恨，他又是完全容不得沙子的性情，便不再言语。一名家主道：“聂宗主此言正是。况且温情既然是温若寒的亲信，说她没参与过？我是不信的。温狗哪个手上不沾几条人命？也许只是没被我们发现而已！”

Which I got from this source on the internet. At some point I should invest in buying an actual physical copy of this text, but I spent my discretionary Chinese book money on a great copy of Yanxi Palace so I’ll have to wait on my physical MDZS copy.

Anyway, what follows are a bunch of screenshots of the translation process of this section and then some cleanup and a basic summary.

Idk about you all, but I do not call someone a pejorative equivalent of WRH’s toady/crony/trusted ally, while saying “why would she stop his horrible crimes!” and then think that my good friend would have to “turn a blind eye” if we were to let her off when I’m trying very hard to defend her against the masses but am getting steamrolled into agreeing that she probably deserved it.

Indeed, the two things that LXC says in this scene are: “I have heard briefly of Wen Qing’s reputation, it does not appear that she personally murdered anyone…” and “she’s a crony of WRH, how would she have stopped his atrocities?”

Now, I actually like him more after realizing this fact, because he was being mildly bitchy about this! And honestly, given that the Wen burned down his house and killed his dad and killed a bunch of Lan cultivators and broke Wangji’s leg and kidnapped Wangji and nearly killed Xichen himself and he had to flee with a bunch of their sacred texts…I’d say he’s earned the right to be bitchy about them.

But also if I were Wen Qing depending on Zewu-jun for his excellent defense lawyering skills at my criminal trial I would want him disbarred. And also fired.

#lan xichen #nie mingjue #so i have no real bad feelings about the fan translation or the official i just thought the chinese was really fun to read!#my meta #my posts #my translation #anyway if I were Wen Qing I would want him fired #and possibly prevented from defense lawyering for anyone else

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ge · 10 months

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what do you like about rotmhs? like what draws you in?

GAHH IM SO GLAD YOU ASKEDDD at the top of my head thhe top three things i felt really drew me into and made me fall in love w rotmhs is the found family/bonds before blood narrative, the action/fight scenes, and the comedy..

rotmhs is not a romance and i feel like that really pushes people away from reading it, especially folks who were first introduced to east asian novels through bl (specifically mxtxs novels like mdzs tgcf etc etc) which i feel is incredibly disappointing because yallre missing out on a certain depth of writing and nuance you otherwise wouldnt get in a romance focused novel. (orv is another extremely popular knovel with no romance.. if you like orv PLEASE give rotmhs a shot)

rotmhs is about a dead man resurrected a hundred years into the future having to come to terms w the fact that everyone he loved is dead and that the only home he ever had was destroyed, its inhabitants and centuries worth of teachings burned to the ground, and that it was partially his fault these things happened, so in order to prevent a future catastrophe he knows is on the horizon, he trains the youth of this new generation and finds a new home surrounded by ghosts in the wreckage of his home of his past

⬆️…very dramatic but somewhat accurate barebones synopsis of rotmhs which is fairly faithful enough methinks.. rotmhs doesnt make a point of going ‘heyy these guys are family nowww theyre brothers and sisters and love each other like familyyy’ LOL the growth is very subtle and before u can really blink ur like ‘oh man.. chung myung would kill for these kids. obliviously though. i dont think he knows he even likes them’ all the while hes still aching w the loss of his loved ones before.. if we’re being really really honest chung myung, the mc, truly is the star of the show and a character i got attached to incredibly quickly.. hes so stupid but so smart he has so many issues i want to hit him with my car then nurse him back to health just to hit him again

chung myung himself is a whole other thing i could get into but he has so many layers.. so much depth.. on the surface ud look at him and think what a punk but look a little closer and then ud think oh this punk has depression ptsd survivors guilt hallucinations etc etc LIKE DAMN.. I THIUGHT HE WAS JUST A FUNNY LITTLE GUY WHYD I GET SUCKER PUNCHED

what was i even talking about. OH right romance. please please dont let the lack of romance dissuade you, imo it is soooo refreshing to read something that isnt focused on romance like i love yaoi like the next bl reading bitch but damn.. ive always been into found family and while the bl novels i have read did always have a little hint of it, i always wanted more and rotmhs fills that void

(that being said i cant stop yall from shipping if yall want LOL im guilty of shipping charas too despite everythiing i just said… if yall want yalls yaoiyuri fix may i direct yalls attention to the ‘doomed by the narrative, tragic best-friends-to-almost-lovers tangchung’ & ‘love at first sight sweethearts iseolsoso’ ….. :SMILES: I LOVE TANGCHUNG..!!!!!!)

NEXT, the action and fight scenes in rotmhs, even in written text form, are sublime to say the least.. my fail cis dudebro trait is that i love crazy insane adrenaline rushing heart pumping shounen-esque battles so much that i could typically care less for the rest of that specific piece of media as long as the fights are good.. FORTUNATELY FOR ME rotmhs is crazy good at balancing its comedy, action, and otherwise more ‘mundane’ scenes together so harmoniously that its such fun read even when theres no swords crossing or heads being beaten in

also important to note, despite being a knovel w korean naming of characters/places, rotmhs actually takes place in ancient china in a wuxia setting so jumping head first into it wont be all that confusing for first time readers/cmedia fans and u can use ur knowledge of cnovels to fill in the gaps.

theres not really much more i have to say on the topic of fighting, im just personally a huge fan of the crazy spectacles rotmhs brings to the table.

saved this for last but THE COMEDY…!!!!!!!! after being soo dramatic w all my previous points and comments ur probably thnkng rotmhs is heavy and somber w no breathing room.. WELL YOURE WRONG. ROTMHS IS FUNNY AS HELL quips and jokes and simple funny actions and scenes litter nearly every page. i mentioned this novel balances its action and comedy well and im NOT LYING youd think maybe the heavy action and light comedy would awkwardly clash but u cldnt be more further from the truth.. rotmhs wears action and comedy like a pair of twin gloves

rotmhs handles its action and comedy in equal doses and it all fits together like matching puzzle pieces, like i really cant stress enough how fun it is to read. not every fight scene is somber, most of the time its chung myung oneshotting someone by hitting them across the head so hard they pass out..

unfortunately im not really the best at listing instances so its be better for u to go read it for urself but this scene from one of the later chapters is soo funny every time i read it i start giggling

(LIGHT/MINOR SPOILERS FOR THE NOVEL it probably doesnt even matter u wont even remember this when u start reading)

right so i think thats most of it.. too lazy to read through everything i just wrote so if nothing makes sense… well. …well!

rotmhs deserves to have the same amount of fame as ORV and MDZS and TGCF have and it is my civil duty as one of the oldest mxtx novel outlets on tumblr to put yall on it..

my thumbs hurt from typing so im done now but if u have anymore questions PLEASE ASK IM SO DESPERATE TO TALK ABOUT ROTMHS ok byyyeeeeeeee

#rotmhs #rotbb #return of the blossoming blade #return of the mount hua sect

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smittenskitten · 13 days

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Can someone confirm if A Dream Within a Dream is the adaptation of Ill Fated Consort or not!!!!

#a dream within a dream #the rebirth of an ill fated consort #the summary doesn't seem like it neither does the character names!!!#idk idk someone linked the novel in the drama so yeah #cnovel #cnovel text #cdrama #cdrama text

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veliseraptor · 1 year

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actually though you know what, possibly the thing that drives me most insane about the feelings yakuza lurking about in mdzs fandom, specifically those dedicated to a really, really shallow moral dichotomy, is the way that. okay. how do I say this.

one of the things I found so deeply refreshing about getting into mdzs, and mxtx's other novels, when I did (and also the cnovels I've read in general, tbh), was getting into a text that seemed on first blush tailor-made to work for my general love of morally questionable characters who do bad things who are in awful situations often with no good solutions, and my specific distaste for both (a) morally didactic storytelling and (b) morality-obsessed fandom.

surely, thought I, this fandom, coming from a canon where the protagonist has done absolutely hideous things to people and presumably that's not a deal breaker, can be reasonable about not taking "did this character do bad things: if yes, then bad character must die, if no, then good character perfect angel" as the beginning, middle, and end of the matter. surely! finally, a place where I can lay down my arms and my weary head, cease bearing endless arguments about who's right or who's bad and who you're allowed to like, because, you know, surely it's obvious that's not the point here

and then. and then.

it just feels like, you know, finally feeling like I had a little corner of fandom where I could just roll around in people being terrible and coping badly with their problems and have the conversation not be dominated by circle-jerking about moral correctness, because that's what the text itself seemed to be actively disinterested in doing, and then here come a whole bunch of fucking clowns hellbent on making everything about morality all over again.

and I truly cannot overstate how much I don't care about that as a lens of "analysis" (to give it a generous name), but I also cannot overstate how much it feels like everybody thinks I should care, and how tiring it is to feel like I'm once again just soaking in a downpour of people yelling about how morally upright and correct they are when like. I came here specifically because I, foolishly, thought this wasn't what we were going to be doing.

i'm just extremely fucking tired and it feels like things have been particularly rancid lately. which sure sucks the joy out of doing things like "writing fic" let me tell you

#lise's aggressively bitchy opinions about irrelevant and unimportant matters #important text posts

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cnovelartreblogs · 6 months

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with tumblr dying, do you know of any open discord communities for danmei and cnovels?

Hey hey!

The only public fandom server I'm part of for Chinese media (...virtually the only public fandom server I'm in at all, and my personal main hang-out spot on Discord...) is @merinnan et al's Daomu Biji server.

It's the nicest, chillest, most welcoming public fandom server I've ever been in - not that we haven't had our moments of drama, but they've been rare, and I've always felt comfortable there - and I've made a lot of friends too. That said, if you're not into DMBJ and/or as obsessed with Zhu Yilong as I am, I can't imagine it'd be a great fit.

Also, so - I'm @unforth, and my day job is that I own and operate an indie micropress, Duck Prints Press, that publishes original work by fanartists and fanauthors. As part of that, I and the staff involved with that run a "Book Lover's" Discord server. While it's sort of a combo "about the Press" and "about all queer books" and "about whatever we feel like talking about" server, we do end up talking about danmei a fair amount because multiple of the people involved in the Press, including obviously me, are into that kind of thing. Like we do a weekly chat on Wednesday about what we're reading and yesterday's was like, "here's one mlm YA book! here's a thriller in Dutch! here's the Yuri manga I just read! And here are the eighteen bajillion things we're all currently reading on Bilibili oh and I started Poyun." You're certainly welcome to join us. What we talk about there really boils down to what the people who are there want to talk about, ya know?

About a million years ago, I started building a cnovelartreblogs Discord server myself, but I've been so frackin busy the last couple years that I've never managed to finish setting it up the way I'd like. That said, it's got penciled in rules and channels for some of the more popular cnovel fandoms (mostly danmei, tho there is a Please Don't Laugh section). If I could get help moderating it, I could open it.

I just really don't have the ability to do it myself anymore, my days right now are like:

wake up

scroll tumblr and do upkeep on the art side blogs (while sitting with my kids and helping them get ready for the day) (1.5 hrs or so)

study Chinese (while sitting with my kids and helping them get ready for the day (.5 hrs, tho I wish it was more, if I can manage more than 30 minutes then I can actually try reading a real damn book but I only have the time maybe once or twice a month)

work (7 to 8 hours on weekdays, often more on the weekends, bonus if my kids are around and my wife is at work, such as tomorrow)

try to be a good mom (all the hours)

errands, chores, kid after school activities, etc. (1 to 3 hours a day)

read while snuggling kids on the couch and trying to ignore the tv (an hour if I'm lucky)

sleep (8ish hours, I hope)

there's just no wiggle room left for me to do any extra fandom stuff right now, sigh.

(sorry to whine about that part. it's not relevant. I just got my covid booster yesterday and I feel terrible today so I'm feeling sorry for myself. it's truly not a bad life overall I'm just perpetually exhausted)

#unforth replies #idk how to tag this

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hoasens · 9 months

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Hi! Fitst of all I love your art sm? 💖💖💖 then for the ship bingo meme: the obvious: RusAme/FrUk/PrusCan/Gerita. Then Vietnam related ships: IndoViet/ CubaViet/ VietPhili (or PhiliViet) and VietChu?

hello! thank you so much, i really love your content too.

ships i already answered found here: fruk rusame

gerita

ok preface my images for some reason aren’t working so you just get block of texts (sorry)

prucan: i never got why it was so popular and i really disliked it back in 2018, still do. i was a die hard pruaus stan and i didn’t understand why people liked it so much bc no interactions nor historical backing? like even pruame made more sense and had historical interactions plus canon

indoviet: two socially awkward introverts together, super cute. also bonus for irl historical interactions between the 2 countries. they’re kinda the mom and dad friend couple of asean.

cubaviet: power couple!! i think they would look so cute together.. also another bonus for irl historical ties. they would just look so good together i dig it so much

philviet: MY GO TO SHIP FOR VIET! at first it was kinda a “what-if” joke because a lot of my friends are filo, i’m like the only viet person in one of my online friend groups. but after seeing fanart and reading the 6 fics on ao3 i fell really in love with their historical parallels and how well their personalities compliment eachother. i just think they’re adorable together and my friendships with different filos makes the pairing more personal to me.

vietchu: i used to really dislike them and get icked by it but it honestly grew on me, they’re very much doomed lovers and it’s a relationship that would never work out. they understand eachother the most, but that’s what causes the downfall of their love. i think it’s just very complicated feelings and it reminds me of the imperial court dramas i’d watch with my aunties when i was a small kid & the cnovels id read when i was older. good aesthetics

#ask #long post

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stellarish · 10 months

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Sketches of of some Tai Sui dudes feat. dice and an expression meme

#drawing Zhou Ying grinning like that was HEALING honestly #I've never drawn him looking genuinely happy before and I was not prepared for how much joy it would bring me #let him be HAPPY #art #tai sui #xi yue #zhou ying #prince zhuang #wen fei #wen fenghan #traditional art #sketch #stellart #ID in alt text #priest #tai sui priest #cnovel

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baihesgeorg · 9 months

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welcome to this blog! BAIHESGEORG is intended as a space for me to talk about and engage with baihe, as i find the cnovel sphere on tumblr often skews very heavily towards danmei.

while i am a native/heritage chinese speaker, i am not ethnically chinese. sometimes i read novels in translated form, and sometimes as the original, untranslated text.

#叶

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