Gogol’s unrequited love

The Husky and His White Cat Shizun - Chapter 6

Original Title:  二哈和他的白猫师尊

Genres: Drama, Romance, Tragedy, Xianxia, Yaoi

This translation is based on multiple MTLs and my own limited knowledge of Chinese characters. If I have made any egregious mistakes, please let me know.

Chapter Index

Chapter 6 - This Venerable One's Shizun

Xue Meng had lived on Life-Death Peak since he was a child. He was familiar with shortcuts and terrain so he had no problem catching up with Mo Ran

He escorted him all the way to the back of the mountain. The back mountain of Life-Death Peak was the closest place to the ghost realm in the whole world, separated by an enchantment, behind it is the netherworld.

Looking at the miserable situation in the back mountain, Mo Ran immediately understood why that person was clearly at home, but still needed Madam Wang to treat guests in the front hall.

It wasn't that the man didn’t want to help, but he couldn’t step away--

The barrier of the ghost world was broken.

At this moment, the entire back mountain was filled with a heavy spiritual resentment. The ghosts that hadn't taken on a body howled and hovered bitterly in the air. At the entrance of the mountain gate, there was a giant breach ripping through the sky. Behind the breach was the ghost realm, and a tall, bluestone staircase stretching thousand of steps escaped from the barrier cracks. Seeing out from the staircase, the fierce spirits that had regained a flesh body were climbing down this step disorderly and chaotically, rushing from the underworld to the human world.

Any ordinary person would be terrified at the scene unfolding. The first time Mo Ran saw it, he was shocked to the bone, but he was used to it now.

The barrier between the human and ghost realms was set by Emperor Fuxi in ancient times. Today, it was very weak. It would grow weak spots every now and again, which need to be repaired by immortal cultivators. However, this kind of thing not only does little to improve one's cultivation but is thankless with how much spiritual energy it consumes. It was a real drudgery, so few immortals in the upper cultivation world were willing to take this job.

When a fierce spirit was born, the people of the Lower Cultivation Realm were the first to come under attack. As the protectors of the Lower Cultivation Realm, Life-Death Peak was forced to undertake the task of repairing the barrier. The back mountains of the sect faced the weakest point in the barrier all to ensure they could be repaired swiftly.

There would be breaks in the barrier about four or five times a year. It was just like an old, chipped pot; useless.

Now, at the entrance of the ghost world, on the long bluestone stairs, a man stood there with snow-coloured clothes and wide sleeves flowing in the wind. He was surrounded by the aura of his sword, the golden light shimmering. Using his own power to clear out the evil spirits and ghosts, he repaired the small holes appearing in the barrier.

The man had a slender waist and an elegant appearance, with a holy aura and a handsome face. From a distance, it was easy to imagine he was a scholar reading an ancient scroll under a flowering tree. However, looking closely, he had sharp eyebrows, phoenix eyes slanted upwards, and the bridge of his nose was straight and narrow. While he seemed to be gentle and elegant, his eyes were mean and seemingly unkind.

Mo Ran glanced at him from a distance. Although he thought he had prepared himself, when he saw this man appear in front of him alive and healthy again, it made him tremble down to his smallest bones.

Half fear, half. . . excitement.

His Shizun.

Chu Wanning.

This was the person that Xue Meng had cried and begged to see when he arrived at Wushan Hall in the previous life.

It was this man that ruined Mo Ran's ambition, ruined his plans, and was finally imprisoned and tortured to death by Mo Ran because of it.

Logically speaking, if Mo Ran had the chance to avenge himself and defeat the enemy that had blocked his progress.

The sea is wide and free for fish to swim in, the sky is high and the birds could fly endlessly, no one could reign him back anymore. At least, that's what Mo Ran thought.

However, that doesn't seem to be the case.

After his Shizun died, something else seemed to have been buried along with his hatred.

Mo Ran was not a man of culture and didn't recognize any other feeling than being evenly matched with a worthy opponent.

He only knows that here on out, he had no archenemies.

When Shizun was alive, he had been afraid, paranoid, and anxious. When he saw the willow vine in Shizun's hand, the hair on the back of his neck stood on up. He became just like a beaten mutt, just the sound of a wooden club slap caused his teeth to ache and legs to give out. Even his calf muscles would spasm from fear.

Later, when Shizun died, the person Mo Ran had feared the most was finally gone. Mo Ran felt that he had grown and matured, being able to finally commit this act of murdering his teacher.

Afterwards, when looking at the mortal realm, no one dared force him to kneel down, and no longer slapped himself in the face.

To celebrate, he opened the pear blossom white wine, sat on the roof, and drank wine all night.

That night, under the influence of alcohol, the scars that Shizun had inflicted on his back when he was a teenager seemed to feel hot and painful again.

At this moment, when he saw Shizun reappear in front of him, Mo Ran started, filled with hate and anger, but there was also a slight twinge of ecstasy.

Such an opponent, lost and now regained, how can he not please?

Chu Wanning ignored the two apprentices who broke into the back mountains and continued concentrating on fighting the scattered undead.

His facial features were elegant, his eyebrows are evenly long. His phoenix eyes were cast downwards, his cool demeanour powerful. Amidst the demonic air and blood rain, his expression had not changed. His face remained calm, as though he might sit down and burn incense or play the guqin at the moment.

However, such a gentle and beautiful man, at that moment, was holding an icy exorcism long sword dripping with red blood droplets. With a flick of his wide sleeve, the sword's energy sliced through the bluestone steps in an explosion. Crushed stones and bricks rolled down, cracking an immeasurable chasm from the gate all the way to the bottom of the mountain, splitting the staircase and its thousands of steps!

So ferocious.

How many years had it been since he had seen his Shizun's power?

This familiar and powerful dominance made Mo Ran lose all his strength. Shakily, he fell onto his knees with a thump.

It didn't take long for Chu Wanning to kill all the ghosts, and neatly fill in the holes in the barrier to the ghost world. After doing all this, he fell from mid-air and went over to Mo Ran and Xue Meng.

He first glanced at Mo Ran kneeling on the ground, and then raised his eyes to look at Xue Meng, his phoenix eyes holding a powerful chill.

"Causing trouble again?"

Mo Ran sucked in a breath.

Shizun had the ability to always correctly assume any situation.

Xue Meng: "Shizun, Mo Ran went down the mountain, committing the two crimes of stealing and prostitution. Please punish him accordingly, Shizun."

Chu Wanning was silent for a while, expressionless. He coldly remarked: "I know."

Mo Ran: ". . ."

Xue Meng: ". . ."

Both of them were a little confused. Then? Is that it?

However, just when Mo Ran thought tat he had gotten off lucky, he looked up at Chu Wanning and caught a a glimpse of a sharp golden light suddenly cutting through the air. There was a lightening-like crackling sound that slashed across Mo Ran's cheek!!

Drops of blood splashed everywhere!

The speed of that golden light was so fast, Mo Ran didn't even have a moment to close his eyes, let alone dodge it. The skin on his face was flayed open with a fierce pain.

Chu Wanning stood with his hands clasped behind his back, standing coldly in the chilling breeze of teh night air. The air was still filled with the foul aura of fierce spirits and ghosts mixed with the smell of human blood. It made the forbidden area of the back mountains appear even more eerie and terrifying.

In Chu Wanning's hand was a willow vine that had whipped Mo Ran. The vine was narrow and long, with green leaves sprouting from it, hanging down near the edge of his boots.

It was clearly sucha graceful object. Looking at it would have made people think of poems such as "Pliant is the the willow branch I gift to my beloved".

It's a pity that Chu Wanning was neither pliant or had a beloved.

The willow vine in his hand was actually a magic weapon named Tianwen. At this moment, Tianwen was glimmering with golden red light, piercing through the surrounding darkness, and also reflecting in the bottomless depths of Chu Wanning's eyes.

Chu Wanning pursed his lips, and said sensibly: "Mo Weiyu, you are so bold. Should I really not do something to discipline you?"

If this really was the fifteen-year old Mo Ran, he might not have taken this exclamation seriously, thinking that Shizun was just trying to scare him.

But after being reborn, Mo Weiyu had thoroughly experienced Shizun’s "control" with his blood in his previous life. He immediately felt the roots of his teeth ache and blood rushing to his head. His mouth was already moving, ready to deny everything and clear his name

"Shizun. . ." His cheek still bleeding, Mo Ran raised his eyes, staining them with a thin veil of tears. He knew that his current appearance must look extremely pitiful. "This disciple has never stolen. . . has never laid with a prostitute. . . why did Shizun listen to Xue Meng's words and strike me without even listening to my side of the story?"

". . ."

Mo Ran had two tricks to get out of trouble with his uncle. First, act cute. Second, pretend to be pitiful. Now he tried these out on Chu Wanning, trying to look so pitiful that tears almost fell from his eyes: "Is the disciple really so worthless in your eyes? Why doesn't Shizun even give me a chance to defend myself?"

Xue Meng stomped angrily next to him: "Mo Ran! You, you piece of shit! You truly are shameless! Sizun, don't listen to him, don't be fooled by this bastard! He really did steal! All the stolen goods are still on him!"

Chu Wanning looked through his eyelashes, his expression cold: "Mo Ran, you truly never stole?"

"Never."

". . . You should know the consequences of lying to me."

Mo Ran's arms were covered in goosebumps. How could he not know? But he still foolishly persisted: "Shizun, please!"

Chu Wanning raised his hand, and the shiny golden vine waved again, but this time he did not draw it on the face of Mo Ran. Instead, he used it to tightly bind Mo Ran.

This feeling was all too familiar. In addition to whipping people on the regular, the willow vine "Tianwen" has another function——

Chu Wanning stared at Mo Ran, who was held tightly in Tianwen's grasp, and asked again: "Have you never stolen?"

Suddenly, there was a familiar stabbing pain straight in Mo Ran's heart, as if a sharp fanged small snake had slid its way into his chest and was playing with his organs.

Accompanied by the severe pain was an irresistible temptation. Mo Ran couldn't help but open his mouth, his voice hoarse: "I. . . never. . . ah. . . !!!"

Tianwen's golden light seemed to pick up on his lies, glowing harder. The pain caused Mo Ran to break out in a cold sweat, but he still desperately resisted such torture.

This was Tianwen's second function: interrogation.

Once tied up by Tianwen, no one could lie. Whether it was a person or a ghost, dead or alive, Tianwen had a way of forcing them to speak and reveal the answer that Chu Wanning wanted to know.

In his last life, by relying on a strong cultivation base, there was only one person who had finally managed to keep a secret under Tianwen's influence.

That person was the person who had become the emperor of the mortal realm, Mo Weiyu.

After being reborn, Mo Ran had hoped he'd have a bit of luck, thinking that he would still be able to resist the forced interrogation of Tianwen. But after biting his lip for what felt like forever, with big beads of sweat dripping down over his dark eyebrows and full-body trembles, he finally bowed before Chu Wanning's boots in pain, gasping for breath.

"I. . . I. . . stole. . ."

The pain abruptly disappeared.

Mo Ran hadn't even caught his breath before Chu Wanning asked another question, his voice even colder than before.

"Did you commit debauchery?"

Smart people don't do stupid things. Since he hadn't been able to resist before, it was even more impossible now. This time, Mo Ran didn't even resist, and when the pain struck, he went so far to even shout: "Yes yes I did!!!! Shizun please! No more!"

Xue Meng's face turned blue at his side. He exclaimed with shock: "You, how can you. . . That Rong Jiu is a man, you actually. . ."

No one paid attention to him. As the golden light of Tianwen slowly dimmed, Mo Ran gasped for breath, his whole body was drenched as if he had just been fished from the water. His face was as white as paper, his lips still trembling, and he collapsed on the ground, unable to move.

Through sweaty eyelashes, he looked up at Chu Wanning's elegant figure, wearing a green jade crown and wide sleeves that fell to the floor.

A strong hatred suddenly surged into his heart - Chu Wanning! This Venerable One wasn't wrong in is treatment of you in his past life, that much is true!! Even after being reborn, the hatred still burns strong! Fuck all eighteen generations of your ancestors!!

Chu Wanning didn't know that this crafty disciple was going to fuck all eighteen generations of his ancestors. He stood there for a while with a sullen expression, and then said.

"Xue Meng."

Although Xue Meng knows that men were the popular choice among rich businessmen and wealthy households, and many people play with male prostitutes just for something new and not really because they liked men, he still couldn't digest it. After a while, he said: "Shizun, this disciple is here."

"Mo Ran went against the three mandates on corruption, debauchery, and deception. Take him to the Yan Luo Hall so he can repent. Bring him to the Platform of Righteousness and Evil tomorrow morning so that he receive a public punishment."

Xue Meng was startled: "What. . .? Public punishment?"

Public punishment means taking the disciples who have committed severe transgressions in front of the disciples of the whole school, in front of everyone, even the ladies in the dining hall, and punishing them for the crowd.

Utterly shameful.

It should be known that Mo Ran was a disciple of Life-Death Peak. Although the disciplinary measures in the school were strict, because of Mo Ran's special status - his uncle pitied him for losing his parents so young and was scavenging outside for fourteen years - he couldn't bear to punish Mo Ran. No matter what Mo Ran did, he would just get a small lecture in private, and he would be beaten.

But Shizun wouldn't even save the face of the sect leader. He wanted to take his precious nephew to the Platform of Righteousness and Evil and publicly punish and shame Young Master Mo in front of the entire sect. This was something even Xue Meng hadn't expected.

Mo Ran, however, wasn't surprised.

He lay on the ground with a sneer at the corner of his mouth.

How great and selfless his Shizun was.

Chu Wanning was truly cold-blooded. In his previous life, when Shi Mei died in front of him, Mo Ran cried and pleading, pulling on his clothes, kneeling on the ground and begging him for help.

But Chu Wanning turned a deaf ear.

And so his disciple had breathed his last breath before him, and even with Mo Ran crying his heart out next to him, Chu Wanning simply stood there and ignored his sobs.

Now all he was doing was putting him on the Platform of Righteousness and Evil to be dealt with before the public. There was nothing strange about this.

Mo Ran could only resent how weak his cultivation base was now. He couldn't peel off Chu Wanning's skin, rip out his nerves, drink his blood, can’t pull his hair back, can't insult him, can’t torture him and destroy his dignity, make him desire nothing but death. . .

He hadn't been able to hide the beast-like hatred in his eyes, and Chu Wanning picked up on it.

He faintly glanced at Mo Ran's face, a stoic expression on a gentle and elegant face.

"What are you thinking about?"

Fuck!

Tianwen hadn't been removed yet!

Mo Ran once again felt the vines tying him up, and his internal organs felt like they were about to be squeezed into mush. He yelled in pain, panting and roaring out the thoughts in his head——

"Chu Wanning, you think you're so refined! Watch me fuck you to death!"

No one made a sound.

Chu Wanning: ". . ."

Even Xue Meng was stunned: ". . ."

Tianwen suddenly retracted Chu Wanning's palm, turning into a small speck of golden light before disappearing altogether. Tianwen was made from the bones and blood of Chu Wanning and could appear when summoned and vanished at will.

Xue Meng's face was pale and he stuttered: "Shi-Shizun. . ."

Chu Wanning didn't say a word. His delicate black and slender eyelashes lowered, examining his palms for a while. Then, he raised his eyes, his face even, but his complexion even colder. He glared at Mo Ran with a gaze saying "this disciple deserves death", then said in a low voice:

"Tianwen is broken, I am going to go fix it."

Chu Wanning threw down these words, turned and left.

Xue Meng was kind of slow: "How could an immortal weapon like Tianwen be broken?"

Chu Wanning heard it, and glanced back at him with a look of "this disciple deserves death" as well. Xue Meng shuddered.

Mo Ran lay on the ground, half-dead, with a blank expression.

What he had been thinking really was looking for a way to fuck Chu Wanning to death. He knew that the Master Chu, who held titles like "Yuheng of the Night Sky, Beidou Immortal", had always paid attention to elegance and correctness, and he couldn't stand being stepped on by others, defiling him.

But he didn't want Chu Wanning to know that he was thinking that!

Mo Ran whimpered like a stray dog, covering his face.

Thinking of the look in Chu Wanning's eyes when he was leaving, he felt that he probably did not have long to wait until his death.

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Love And Lost - Clint Barton/Pietro Maximoff - SFW

Title: Love And Lost Author: Donnie Fandom: Marvel Cinematic Universe Setting: The Helicarrier Pairing: Clint Barton/Pietro Maximoff Characters: Clint Barton, Pietro Maximoff, Wanda Maximoff, Natasha Romanov, Bruce Banner, Tony Stark, Nick Fury, Steve Rogers Genre: Hurt/Comfort/Romance Rating: T Chapters: 1/1 Word Count: 1273 Type of Work: One-Shot, Part of the Clint Barton Bingo: Round Two Series Status: Complete Warnings: Gay, Slash, Yaoi, Mentions of Character Death, AU – Canon Divergent, Fix-It Fic, Pietro Didn't Die, AU - Soulmates Disclaimer: I don't own anything. Summary: Only two things could put Clint in such a sour mood over a victory, but only one thing could bring him back out of it. AN: Here we are at another Bingo fill, and I'm pretty happy to get through another one. I've been having a lot of issues at home lately, and so writing again felt really nice. Note: While this is a Soulmate AU, and I have a square for that, this isn't what I wanted to write for it. I just wanted to write a Soulmate AU and so it ended up being part of this fill. I hope that's okay.

Clint Barton Bingo Round 2 Masterlist Love And Lost ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ While everyone was fully aware that there had been a few hiccups (Hulk had thrown the wrong truck cab and nearly lost them Natasha, and Tony had gotten miserably turned around in some cavern system beneath the Hydra hideout), it had been a full success. Wanda had even whooped when they returned to the Helicarrier and they were told that they'd done a bang-up job. Her high-five with Steve and then Natasha caused a full round of them from Thor, who never did take 'no' for an answer when it was time to revel.

The one storm cloud in the room seemed to be Clint, who had chosen the highest point in the main deck and parked there. Hiding out and absently glaring at the small, makeshift party below him, his displeasure didn't go unnoticed. When Natasha clapped him on the shoulder, Pietro realized absently that he wasn't the only one that recognized just who was missing. “You should go tell him it's time to get out of those sweaty leathers.” She spoke gently, a slight smirk on her red lips, “He'll probably need someone who's more gentle with him than I would be.” The knowing look she shot her friend only had Pietro's stomach flipping and falling into his feet. Did he really want to mess with the Hawk when he looked so... Irate? Well, it wasn't like Pietro was known for his patience or ability to think clearly when he wanted something. His lover's silence wasn't so strange as the fact that he couldn't seem to wipe the scowl off his face, but he was sure he could help. Zipping up to the current perch that Clint had taken up, Pietro leaned on the railing with a small, nervous smile on his face. It was the same look he wore when he didn't want to talk about something but knew that he had to, and the second that Clint gave a cursory glance over, he knew that he'd have to give in and try. If he didn't, the impossible task of getting Pietro to trust him would have been for naught. At any moment, the precarious precipice that he stood on with the kid could bowl over and he'd be up shit creek without a paddle and without Pietro to keep him company. “What's up, kid?” The tone made Pietro flinch, and Clint reached out to take his hand in his own gloved one, gently stroking his thumb over the other's knuckles. “Sorry. What's on your mind?” “You.” While the answer was cocky as usual, his voice quaked slightly and he looked away, like he might just as quickly retreat as he had arrived. “Who put bee in your underwear?” Snorting a little at the word choice, Clint rolled his eyes. “It's not like you'd really understand it, babe.” He muttered, “It's not like you can just lose your powers.” It took approximately a second before Pietro was sitting beside the elder man, dangling his legs from their tower, leaning against his arm. The concerned look burning his eyes into the other's hands told Clint he caught the words just as easily as if they hadn't been so vague. “You lost your bow.” “I did.” Glancing back over, Clint couldn't help the beginnings of a tiny smile pulling at the corners of his lips, and he had to turn his glare back to Tony having another little spat with Steve to keep his sour mood. Whatever it was they were fighting over, Clint figured one honest talk would get them to the other side of it. Maybe. Then again, knowing those two, it would never happen. Still, his eyes found Pietro's little scowl once more and he saw his own arm wrap around the kid's shoulders more than he registered it happening. Tugging him in closer, he waited for the words to fall from the other's lips, letting him pick them out all on his own. “That is like losing arm, no?” He finally asked, his sour expression only making Clint chuckle a little bit. Honestly, the kid was too cute when he was mad at things, it was why Clint could never keep his hands to himself. “Yeah, I guess it is.” Clint nodded in response, pressing his temple to Pietro's, “And I can't believe I lost it. But... I guess there are worse things to lose.” The quiet, tight-lipped frown that overcame him as he looked at the white-haired nineteen year old beside him made Pietro go stiff. Why did he constantly have to bring that up? It hadn't been a good day for anyone. “You did not lose me.” The definitive tone told Clint he didn't want to talk about it, but sometimes he had to get those feelings out when he had them. “But I could have.” “And you would not have known what you were losing.” Pietro added after a moment, “You have lost a piece of you, now.” “I thought I lost a piece of myself in Sokovia.” Clint sighed, shaking his head a little, “The bow can be replaced, I just need to talk to Bruce and Fury.” He informed easily, “It won't be that hard to get another one.” It's impossible to find another person like you. Absently, Clint's fingers worked through that soft, pale hair, trailing down the kid's shoulder, chest, and to his hip. Beneath his track suit, Pietro swore he could feel the initials in his hip throbbing, and he forced himself to look away. CB had always thrown him for a loop until he'd started to come to terms with the fact that the old man he kept bothering in the forest was, indeed, his soulmate. “I get the point.” Pietro muttered, pouting as his voice grew louder, “But it should not--” “It does matter. Now, hush. We need to go get ready for whatever bullshit party Tony and Thor are cooking up, right?” A smile was on his lips as he nuzzled his cheek into the other's shoulder, the elder man feeling oddly better about everything despite himself. Clint always found it odd how he would end up comforting Pietro when he'd been the upset one in the first place, but he didn't doubt the effectiveness of it. Pietro's tried and true remedy for Clint being upset worked far too well sometimes. He'd simply have to work harder to get Pietro to think about something, anything other than the track he'd accidentally ended up on. A party and a good amount of attention would do his soulmate some good. Kissing his temple, he popped up beside him and held out a hand. “Let's go, alright, pidge?” “Alright...” Pietro took his hand and rose to his feet, letting Clint help him to the nearest way down. Once his feet were on solid ground, he didn't let a breath of air come between them; even when they were changing. Really, sometimes the kid was indescribably clingy. Still in the back of Clint's mind, his missing bow wore on his ability to have a good time. Even if Pietro was doing a fairly good job of distracting him, he couldn't quite get his head wrapped around what he was going to do; It took him a solid two hours before he sought out Bruce to discuss the thoughts he'd had on his new bow. Pietro knew better than to get in the way, so he opted to chat at Wanda and Natasha in Sokovian instead, never letting his eyes drive away from his lover. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ AN: I'm finally feeling okay enough to write some again, so let's see what all I can get done. I still have no internet, so getting donations via Ko-Fi (Sunshinecackle) would be great! It's okay if you can't, but maybe promoing me would help! We have a goal of $75 to get the internet set up and everything, and if we could do that ASAP, it would be so great. We currently have no money at all. Translations: Raz na raz ne prikhoditsya. - Russian – From time to time, it does not happen. Prompt: N5 – Lost Bow

Some final commentary on Cosmic

which turned into yet another analysis of JDC, Tsukumojuku and Jorge Joestar because I have zero self-restraint. Half this post is searching for overarching themes and wacky theories, have fun with my ramblings I guess

[big spoilers for Cosmic and Tsukumojuku, not really for Jorge Joestar]

While I decided to finish Cosmic first, the recommended reading order is Cosmic (1st half) -> Joker -> Cosmic (2nd half). I guess this better ties both books together and helps avoid some Joker spoilers that are in Cosmic. The new edition even encourages it by labeling the tomes of Cosmic with Ryu and Sui, and Joker with Sei and Ryo. So you’re supposed to read “Seiryo in Ryusui” *rimshot* The cover art is also meant to be put together in that order (notice that the last cover also connects to the first though, and you can try putting the shorter edges together too):

On the book’s theme, and some meta:

I’m actually glad I’ve read Tsukumojuku before this, as it gave me a solid grip on the meta and the ridiculous detectiving. It made me LOVE the very ending, especially the “walking towards the end of the story with this tiny last moment lasting forever” part -- in hindsight of Tsukumojuku’s ending I almost cried at this point. The meaning’s a bit different, of course: Tsukumojuku has the triplets realize they should leave their daydream, and so it was both a sad and joyful ending, with them trying to stretch their last moments being ‘Tsukumojuku’. Cosmic has Juku and Yasha being a little apprehensive but determined to reach ‘the end of the story’, and at the end, they’re happy and joking around while (wittingly or not?) walking into eternity as the book ends, and with it their existence (...which doesn’t sound nearly as dramatic when you know there's a sequel).

Adding to that, I believe the last words imply the author (=the heavens forever watching over the characters) is joyful about the end (’the heavens themselves laughing’). Note that when Juku (or is it?) first appears in the book, in that post office scene, right after the 19 consecutive tragedies we just had to read through, we learn that ‘the heavens have been crying, but now it was as if they started laughing’, and Juku looks up at the sky and smiles. The end of the epilogue has the second-person someone (the reader?) be sad about the book coming to an end, with statements like ‘just two paragraphs remain until the end’ (and there really are only two short paragraphs in the book left after this!), and describing the heavy rain that starts in those two paragraphs as ‘the heavens crying’ (so... the sadness of both the reader and the author?). Finishing a good book, whether as a writer or a reader, is indeed both a joyful and a sad event. Similarly, the detectives are all happy and inexplicably sad when Juku claims the case has been solved. (There’s an echo of this theme even in Jorge Joestar, when with mere 15 pages left until the end of the book Jorge cries because ‘this adventure’s almost over’.)

I love the reccurring existential theme having to do with being a fictional character. It wasn’t as in-your-face as in Tsukumojuku, but it was there. While I skipped that in recaps, one of the locked room stories features a delusional man who believes he’s just a character in a novel. While scary, this belief is somewhat comforting too, and he notes it’d be nice to have a role to fulfill; to die with the sense you achieved all that you were meant to do, that The Author loved and appreciated you for who you were, and that you’re going to live eternally through a novel. (Jorge Joestar has Tsukumojuku mention how having a role to fulfill under Beyond’s care gave him comfort -- same thing, really.) But the character understands that all stories will eventually undergo destruction, and dreads it. Of course, the final message of the book, strengthened by the final events (the cult’s failure, Shiranui dying right after Juku’s birthday, and even --the book itself ending--), is that we have to accept that nothing can last forever, and the old will be replaced by the new, stories included.

When Juku and Yasha revealed the culprit’s initials, I honestly thought that he’d turn out to be the author, and the reason why they got different initials was that Juku saw the pen name (Seiryoin Ryusui) and Yasha the real name (Kanai Hidetaka). Since Yasha seemed shocked that Juku said ‘S’, I thought it meant that Yasha saw a full name but neither of the initials was ‘S’. I also thought Otohime’s advice -- to ‘look at the events from a distance’, to ‘withdraw yourself from events’ -- actually meant you have to look at the story from a distance... that is, lean back and look at the book you’re holding, which has the author’s name on the cover. Later, the sudden fourth wall break during the press conference scene, with the author prompting the reader to think carefully about who the Locked Room Lord may be, and writing his signature right under that question, only made me more sure. And there were a bunch of scenes before the Big Reveal in which other JDC characters reacted to the solution with feeling as if their world was destroyed, or getting drunk, or stressing out rather hard, so I expected they got hit with existential crisis upon learning The Truth, and that Juku will just go full meta and say that the culprit is the author: the one who really designed and 'committed’ the murders. Though with the book ending as it did, it’s not a stretch to say that Seiryoin really IS confirmed to be the true Locked Room Lord. In a way.

Other random comments:

This book is positively untranslatable. It features stuff like extensive kanji wordplays; messages in Caesar cipher but using the dictionary order of hiragana; deciphering a number as if it was an old-fashioned pager message; or reading the final message by putting the first syllable of the last kanji of the victims’ names together. And that damn Matsuo Bashou pun. All the name puns, really.

The language is rather hard, definitely harder than Maijo’s works. I think I’ll take some time to get better Japanese skills before going for Joker. (The JDC book I expect to enjoy the most is The Simons’ Case, though -- young Ajiro dadding over solving a case with kid Juku sounds amazing, and it’s a lot of fans’ fave)

For some reason, the main characters sure like to have the ‘castle’ kanji (城) in their names, like 鴉城 蒼司 (Ajiro Souji), 龍宮 城之介 (Ryuuguu Jounosuke), and  天城 漂馬 (Amagi Hyouma). ...I can’t help but notice that a certain 城字 ジョースター (Jouji/Jorge Joestar) would fit right in, lol. He pretty much is a meta-detective already, what with all the confidence and insight he gets from his Beyond.

I live for Ajiro’s and Juku’s relations. LOVE this stressed detective dad being proud of his ridiculously kind detective son.

Unexpectedly I also loved the friendship between Juku and Yasha. (With added tears because, y’know. Inugami Yasha. Investigating with Tsukumo Juku. Being friends and stuff.)

I like Ryuuguu Jounosuke quite a lot, both because of his character / reasoning skills, and because he’s as canonically aroace as he can be in a 90s book. not that you’d know that with all the Hikimiya/Ryuuguu yaoi fanart on pixiv

Unfortunately, I can’t praise Seiryoin for good rep as he’s miserable with other representation. The locked room chapters feature the depraved rapist bisexual trope, then a Bury Your Lesbians trope, and then this weird thing where a young guy has a gay crush and concludes that he must have become gay because he was abused by his mother (???)... but as it later turns out, in reality (ie. not in the manuscript) the object of the crush was a woman, so the gay part didn’t even happen. The fuq? Also there’s a one-scene-only black woman officer who’s only there so we can be told how physically strong and intimidating she is and I’m not sure how I should feel about that. I’m also pissed off that when a male detective uses vague reasoning out of nowhere, more a supernatural feeling than anything else, he gets called a meta-detective and is oh ah so elite and amazing!, but when Nemu does it it gets called ‘woman’s intuition’ and ‘fuzzy reasoning’ and she’s not considered a meta-detective, fucking really? (Maybe it is a little different, idk, she wasn’t detectiving a lot in this so we didn’t really see what she’s capable of)

On the other hand, I liked that the way Juku encouraged Nemu to become a detective involved using his connections to arrange meetings with other disabled detectives, so she could talk frankly with them and get a feel for how high-tier detectiving while disabled (esp. in terms of sight-related disabilities) is like. That’s a nice detail.

Speaking of him... Tsukumo Juku is pretty Mary Sue-ish in this, which I don’t mind (and I would be more surprised if it didn’t turn out to be intentional later), but I can imagine other readers not really liking him that much. I’ve read that Juku unfortunately doesn’t really get deeper characterization until the Carnival books, where we learn fun little stuff about him, eg. he’s horrible at cooking, and his ringtone is the opening for Manga Nippon Mukashi Banashi (an old anime introducing little kids to folktales). (I’m wondering whether or not the Kintaro thing in Jorge Joestar is related to this somehow? I don’t have many spoilers for Carnival, maybe there’s more folktales references... aside from the Ryuuguu family’s names referencing Urashima Taro, that is. And now I wonder why Jorge gets a folktale-related kids song stuck in his head so easily hmmm)

It was never explained who sent the manuscript to JDC. So far, judging by the scene with the beautiful androgynous person at the post office, and retroactively by the entire Story-sending mess in Tsukumojuku, I’d say it was Juku himself, somehow. A time-travelling Juku from the future, maybe? I don’t know anymore, man, but I’ve read that previous cases of the series come together in Carnival, so here’s hoping it gets explained better than as “a ghost did it maybe”.

For the longest time I kept wondering where the personality dissonance between this Juku and the Detective God in Tsukumojuku came from. Why would this ever gentle, kind and forgiving character be written as some vore murderer monster dude? So, here’s my current Reaching Theory TM. We know the Detective God really is ‘an Angel’ as he claimed, since in the Seventh Story, Tsukumojuku realizes that he himself is actually not ‘the Angel’ but ‘the Beast’ (he thinks about it during that, er... awkward chest pipe moment, if you remember). Now, canon Juku actually is compared to ‘an angel or a god’ in Cosmic, and it’s a good descriptor: he’s kind and forgiving, but has the sorta detached, not-quite-human air; he’s androgynous, unnervingly perfectly beautiful, and one shouldn’t look directly at him for too long. The Detective God, on the other hand, is an Angel in the same way those demons from Jacob’s Ladder are: only when you stop holding onto mortal life (the imaginary world in Beyonds’ case) and accept your death (accept you have to go ‘outside’), you may notice they’re actually angels who have been trying to help you realize the truth. Through brutal means, but still. I guess the Detective God was created by the part of the Beyonds’ subconscious that understands they have to accept the reality, or something. He’s a bit like Silent Hill monsters in this way. Note that the person the Detective God mainly attacks (and possibly talks with him off-screen earlier) is the Original. And the Story it happens in, Fourth (II), is the point after which the Original probably started thinking about the plan involving killing everything they hold dear to make them face reality. It was really Detective God who first made the Original and the Second One aware of ‘God’ -- even if indirectly: getting them to think about ‘God’ by making them refute the claim that Seiryoin is their God, getting them to think about what the presence of ‘the canon Tsukumo Juku’ before them means for their own existence. Or Maijo just likes to write hard vore and i’m thinking too much

why do you hate touken?

Glad you asked!

(Edit: this ended up being a lot longer than I was expectingholy shit????)(Another edit: I forgot to actually censor the word to**ken so now it’s gonna come up in the tags I’m sorry lads)

First of all, I wanna start by saying that I’m not a “saltyfujoshi who’s upset that my yaoi ship isn’t canon” or a “Touka-hatingmisogynist”. I like hidekane but that doesn’t affect my views on touken bc Iknew that it wouldn’t be canon and that a touken endgame was more likely. Also I’vealways loved Touka since I started the series two years ago, but her currentcharacter regression is what’s slowly making me dislike her. Also I’m writingall of this off the top of my head, so sorry if I give any false information orleave important bits out!!

Okay so I actually used to like touken because I thoughtthey had a lot of potential for development and really could’ve been a greatship. My main problem with it is how poorly written the ship is. I’m mainlyfocusing on :re because I loved the og Tokyo ghoul series. Let’s start withtheir development from both characters’ perspectives. Start of :re, we seelight-haired Touka, all beautiful, grown up and mature-looking running her own café.Wonderful! Turns out she built the :re café as a home for Kaneki to come backto, even though everyone else thought he was missed or dead. Tbh I thought itwould be for everyone since she valued her family and friends at Anteiku asmuch as Kaneki but still: it’s really sweet, I can’t fault it much. At the sametime, it’s also very disappointing because og Touka had clear goals in life,wanted to attend school and university and build an independent life and careerfor herself and cared about all of her friends and family equally. That’s theTouka I love. But no, let’s have her wait around for several years for a guyshe’s merely just friends with and doesn’t know that well. Because that’s agreat way to write a strong, independent, smart female main character! Also, whatdid she do for him other than the :re cafe? She recognised Kaneki as Haiseimmediately and said she didn’t want to force herself upon him and make himremember his actual self, which sounds nice of her in theory, but she knew thathe wasn’t actually happy at the CCG and how he was treated there. Yet she didnothing to try and help?? She even told Tsukiyama to just give up when hewanted to save Kaneki?? I thought she loves him? Touken development from Kaneki’sperspective: he thinks Touka is very pretty. That’s really it. And that’s whilehe has amnesia. What did she doexactly to inspire him to keep living? What did she sacrifice for him? What otherromantic things does he say about her except for her pretty appearance? Notmuch.

Let’s skip forward a bit. Touka and Kaneki haven’t seen eachother properly for ages and haven’t had a proper conversation. Bear in mind:they’re still just friends at this point. Not even best friends or anything.Kaneki’s spent more time with Nishiki than with Touka at this point. This is agreat opportunity for them to catch up and have a nice, meaningfulconversation. What does Touka think a great thing to bring up in thisconversation is? Ask if Kaneki’s a virgin! This is based solely on “how helooked at her” when he had amnesia.Not long after asking this, she says that she’s always trying to find ways tostop him from leaving, which heavily implies she was trying to tie him downwith a relationship which is really gross. I understand that she hasabandonment issues due to her past, but that isn’t a good enough excuse. Themeaningful conversation I was hoping for comes back into light when the two ofthem start talking about Yoriko and Touka asks Kaneki about Hide and how hecopes with it. Kaneki gives her a heartfelt answer about how he could never doanything concrete because he’ll start missing Hide again. This is a wonderful opportunityfor them to mutually discuss what it’s like to be a ghoul with a human bestfriend and how to handle the pain, therefore developing and deepening theirrelationship. Let’s have a quick recap of the atmosphere here. They’re in anabandoned warehouse in the middle of a war, they’re tired and need to rest(which Kaneki suggests) and talking about their dead friends. Of course, thissituation is BURSTING with romantic, sexual tension and Touka feels the need toclimb on him and kiss him out of the blue. Does this lead to them discussingtheir feelings like adults, seeing as Touka stans love to talk about her “amazingcharacter development and maturity”? Nope, they fuck without any protection orforeplay out of an impulsive decision which results in pregnancy. One, how clichécould you possibly get? Two, didn’t Itori say that conception with ghouls wasvery unlikely at the start? And we’re supposed to believe that this chaptermakes sense and isn’t ooc at all? We’re supposed to just accept it because “she’sa girl and he’s a boy”? Kaneki could’ve had a sex scene with Hide or Nishiki inthat chapter and it would’ve made the same amount of sense tbh.

Moving on again. I would’ve been alright with chapter 125 ifthey had realised what they had done was irresponsible, yet they recognise thefeelings they have towards each other and start building a healthy romanticrelationship at a reasonable pace, discussing their issues and working toresolve them. Or, it could’ve been hinted at or explained that Kaneki is usingTouka/sex as an emotional crutch due to his mental illness. These would’ve madesense. But no, Ishida doesn’t ever discuss the unhealthy aspects of theirrelationship which is what led me to hate the ship even more. Within the next10 or so chapters they’re fucking pregnant and married? Even though they wereonly just friends like 11 chapters prior? Where was the development? How can y’allhonestly think this is good writing? It’s so rushed and forced and makes nosense. They’ve literally been dating for like 2.5 seconds, why are they alreadymarried? They’re married and they hardly know anything about each other! Beforeyou argue this point, lemme explain:

-         We’re supposed to be seeing Touka as Kaneki’sOne True Love and the light of his life but she’s STILL hitting him at thispoint in their relationship. I don’t care how many people try to brush it offas comedy or “tsundere behaviour” it’s domestic abuse! Why is Kaneki’s motherabusing him seen as tragic and a massive factor towards his mental healthissues, yet Touka, the Love Of His Life, punching him into a table (knockinghim unconscious and saying “I feel much better now!” afterwards), pushing himviolently and calling him an idiot when he wants to have a serious conversationwith her is seen as comedy? Why? Because she’s pretty? Because she’s his waifu?It was even shown that he was worried about her hitting him again. I’ve seensome people say “He’s a grown man if it’s abuse he could just leave”. Mostabuse victims don’t recognise it as abuse dumbass!!! He literally said he wasused to being beaten by those he cared about which is why he’s normalised it inhis mind!! Just because she’s a girl it doesn’t make it okay for her to beabusing her partner. Touka stans like to use the excuse “She doesn’t know abouthis past!” which EXACTLY proves the point I’m making. She hardly knows him! Andthey’re married! Regardless of if she knows that he’s an abuse survivor or not,her actions are still gross. Y’all wanna talk about her “character development”but she’s still acting like her angsty 16-year-old self who can’t express herfeelings properly. She’s an adult woman now. It’s not fair of her to treatKaneki like this when he’s been nothing but kind to her throughout theirrelationship.

-         I’ve also seen the excuse “Well, Kaneki left herwhen she has abandonment issues so he’s just as bad as her! It’s mutual abuse!”.First of all, you’ve just admitted the ship is abusive. Congrats, you playedyourself. Secondly, it proves my point again. He hardly knows about her too!You would think that Kaneki would take it upon himself to get to know Touka andher past and try to understand her as a person before marrying her. And we’resupposed to think that he’s smart? Of course, they were only friends at thetime and he had no obligations to Touka but it’s still not great that he lefther. Arguably, he originally left so that he could be strong enough to protectthose he cares about, including her, sooo yeah. The idea that he’s using her asan emotional crutch makes a lot of sense here, but we all know Ishida wouldnever show touken as the unhealthy relationship it is.

Next point, more bad writing. How is Kaneki out here sayingthat Touka is his only reason to live and calling her his best friend? I’m notdenying the fact that he loves her (I truly believe he does, but not to theextent that’s being currently portrayed), but is he forgetting other peoplehave done for him in the past? Who stopped Kaneki from taking his own life?Hide! Kaneki could’ve hallucinated about Touka down in that sewer if she wasreally the Light Of His Life, but no, he thought of Hide because his subconsciousknows that Hide is the only person who could’ve truly saved him at that point. Whatdid Touka do to stop him from taking his life? I’m not trying to say that Hideis better than her, but it makes no sense for Ishida to suddenly keep pushingthe idea that Kaneki’s number one top priority is Touka and pushing hisrelationships with other characters to the side. Don’t even get me started onhow Tsukiyama’s being treated. He starved himself for 3 years and was miserableafter thinking that Kaneki was dead then all of a sudden, he’s happy to plan atouken wedding? Who is this man idk him?? Honestly though, how is Kaneki 100%deeply and madly in love with her when the only romantic development from hisside was calling her pretty? They’ve hardly spent any time together where didhe find the time to fall in love with her and consider her as his best friend. Also,another thing; ghouls getting married via bitemarks is the dumbest thing I’veever heard and sounds like bad fanfiction. Ayato literally ate Touka’s kagunein the past and she’s recovered. Kaneki has been tortured and had his toesripped off in the past and that’s healed. Yet his bitemarks on Touka stayed?What the literal fuck? By this logic, Kaneki is also married to Rize, Amon (inthe ova they were canonly married and Kaneki asked for a divorce), arguablyHide depending on if he bit his shoulder and was already married to Touka fromtheir fight with Tsukiyama in the church. Yet this wasn’t pointed out untilnow. Bad. Writing.

Another point: I cannot believe touken stans are out here really thinking that sex cures depression and that Kaneki found ‘true happiness’ by busting a nut in Touka like lmao are you serious? Being with Touka doesn’t automatically erase his mental illness, the torture he’s been through, his psychological and physical damages and his tragic childhood. Yes, being with her does add a positive aspect to his life but this isn’t how mental illness works at all, you don’t need to be a medical expert to know that, it’s just common sense. 

I think this is my last point so here we go: Touka’scharacter regression due to touken and Kaneki. So far, it probably seems like I100% purely hate Touka, which is not true. I hate how she’s being written andtreated by the author. Like I said previously, I was literally in love with ogTouka. She was a total badass, she was smart, she was independent, she lovedschool, she loved everyone at Anteiku, she loved Yoriko and rabbits and musicand was just such a cool character. I originally shipped her with Kanekibecause I thought they had good potential and her character and independence wouldn’tfalter as a result of a romantic relationship. Well, I was wrong. Currently,Touka’s only relevance to the plot is to look pretty and be Kaneki’s waifu andbearer of his child. Ishida is trying to write her as a soft waifu but at thesame time she acts like an angsty teenager around Kaneki half of the time, howdoes that even work? How could you not possibly think this is unfair to her andis blatantly sexist writing? Because clearly a female lead can’t exist withoutbecoming dependant on a man or becoming a housewife at some point, right? Whydoes her character have to revolve around him yet his character doesn’t have torevolve around her? Why does her character and personality have to suffer as a result of a relationship?News flash: women can be in love and still be their own person. ToukaKirishima, who valued school dearly and loved her best friend Yoriko so muchthat she ate human food solely because she knew how hard Yoriko worked to makeit for her, gave up on her life goals and hardly cared when Yoriko was gonnadie? Even Kaneki thought that was weird. Also, Ishida is trying to push theidea that Touka has become smart and mature and makes good decisions. Uh,where? She waited around for Kaneki for several years when she could’ve beendoing more with her life, she had unprotected sex with him in the middle of awar, she’s now pregnant which puts her at a disadvantage as she has to fightand using her kagune would mean the baby would be absorbed as food for strength,which will cause emotional pain to her and to Kaneki. Wow she’s so smart,Einstein is shaking. Original Touka wouldn’t do this. She’s literally no betteras a 20 something year old woman as she was as a troubled 16-year-old child. Callit character development all you want, it’s character regression. Also, thispart is a bit of a reach I must admit, but Touka’s being drawn to look youngerwhich is really weird? Light-haired Touka at the start actually looks like anadult, yet current Touka looks like a teenager with her original hairstyle and bigshoujo eyes and a small nose and mouth in quite a lot of panels. Ishida evendrew her with the cutesy sparkly shoujo background when she told Kaneki thatshe was pregnant. Was that necessary? You can’t replace her current lack of apersonality with a pretty face, she actually needs character development lol. I’mnot denying that she actually loves Kaneki (once again, I truly think she doesbut needs to learn to express herself better and act like an actual adult).

I have more points I could make, but I’ll stop here becauseI literally wrote a whole essay here lmao. I just want to finish off by sayingthat even though I hate touken, I don’t hate touken shippers because I can seewhy people ship it, but I hate that 95% of you guys blatantly ignore theunhealthy aspects of their relationship and refuse to hear any criticism about Toukaor Kaneki because that’s just gross. The ship and the characters are problematicwhether you like it or not. Like I said, I wrote all of this off the top of myhead so if I’ve said anything that’s incorrect or missed things out please tellme!!

Joseph romance ending ramblings cause fuck it i’m bored 

I entirely see where the criticisms are coming from. The choice to make him seem closeted isn’t one without meaning and the writers should’ve thought about how it would come across, and they’re definitely not handling the push back well. At all. 

However. As the kid of parents who have both cheated, with a sister who has cheated with friends who condone cheating, his story makes a lot of sense and does work pretty well. He isn’t that unhappy. He’s fucking playing you. It’s an act, and from the dialog it’s one he’s used before. 

He wants to have his marriage and keep banging other people on the side so he does that incredibly cliche married man thing of ‘its not working out’ ‘im so unhappy’ but then they decide the hassle of divorce, the loss of reputation, the potential loss of money or access to kids etc. is just not worth it. They’re going to make it work. Give it the old college try. This is literally every piece of media where the main girl boinks a married man. It was set up in this exact same way. 

The unfortunate implications that the writers were fucking idiots to not think about or realize is that by having him be religious, by having his cheating only be with men, they set up a very clear and real and painful reality for a lot of closeted religious gay men who experience compulsory heterosexuality and increased cultural pressure to conform to it. A happy ending for a religious gay man is incredibly uncommon and they ignored this and decided to just keep following that trend. Which is bullshit. 

But Joseph isn’t meant as some incredibly unhappy closeted married man. He’s meant as a cheater who wants to keep the reputation and appearance of a het. marriage and kids and religious cornerstone stuff but also bang people on the side. He asks that of you, to be his side piece, and from the dialog he likely did the same to Robert. Strung along either as a dirty little secret or with the promise of he’ll leave her soon. 

And if it were truly a moment of weakness it would be once. It would be a moment. A single time accident it wouldn’t be a pattern of cheating and wanting to maintain long term extramarital affairs. 

And HOLY SHIT

can we cool it with the dumb shit of ‘if mary was a boy you’d hate her’ no. Stop. You don’t get to erase decades of heavy obvious fandom misogyny with wild accusations like that. If Mary were a dude the story would’ve made it much clearer that Joseph was a cheater not a deeply unhappy closeted religious man. It actually would’ve solved a number of the issues with the story. 

But. If she were a dude there would be so many people absolutely in love with her, drawing their dadsona with her instead. Yaoi fan girls wanting to romance her instead or demanding an ot3 ending. 

The initial reaction to Mary was one rooted in clear and pervasive fandom sexism. Demonizing her to make him seem so much more sad and puppy dog until you realize that out of the two of them she’s probably the one who’s a lot more actually fucking ruined. 

And I’m seeing way too many mlm who are getting hyped and angry about the joseph thing repeating the same shit that fangirls did in the first few hours when it comes to their approach to mary. 

‘cheating isn’t just sex’ you’re right, it’s not. Personally I don’t think what Mary does constitutes cheating, she goes out and drinks and flirts and then returns alone and unhappy. Never acting on it. Just looking for validation she sure as shit ain’t getting at home. 

But Joseph? He fucks other people. And she knows about it. From dialog with her it seems it’s a common issue, so much so that she recognizes his type and his patterns. That’s cheating. And in no way does what she does compare. 

She is not an ‘innocent’ party in this, she could’ve done something, ended things, her coping mechanism is harmful and has led to an alcoholic parent. Which, from experience as the kid in a very similar situation, is fucking miserable. She seems like a pretty fucking neglectful parent but so does he honestly. We get that one good scene with him and his daughter but we also know he’d rather sit around and read about knot tying than stop his two young children vanishing into deep woods. And he’d rather keep them in an unhappy environment he created than deal with it. 

They’re both fucking miserable because of the shit he’s started and caused. She did not cause him to cheat, he made those decissions. 

They fucked up how they handled it by not making it much clearer that he is faking that shit. Even Robert warns you he’s fucking lying. And to some extent I get why they did that, to make it more believable. But that isn’t a decision you can remove from context of an sga man who is religious and married to a woman. It’s poorly handled and deserves a lot of criticism. 

But how about we stop trying to make it ‘even’ stop trying to make Mary into the villain here. They’ve both fucked up, but i kinda think the guy who has boinked people outside of his marriage multiple times but would rather keep his dysfunctional and unhappy family together because it’s easier and better for him, as a pillar of the community, to do so instead of letting things disolve and separate and move on, is probably a bit more to blame than the woman who saw her husband cheat on her time and time again and turned to alcohol because of it. 

And goddamn is this pretty difficult for me to write because i’m basically defending my mom here. And I hate her. As her kid I fucking hate her because she did the same thing, she turned to alcohol and drugs to deal with emotionally unfulfilling relationships and it destroyed us. But know who started that shit? The men. My dad and her partner. Who cheated on her. 

And I’ve seen my dad do the same shit Joseph does. He was in such a bad place, it hurt so much, mom just didn’t understand, new woman did etc. etc. 

It’s common justifications to cheating. Was the decision to have him be religious fucking stupid and cause a whole heap of unnecessary and avoidable drama because it ignored current political and cultural pressures? YES. VERY YES. Does that mean he’s not a scummy cheater who has caused irreparable damage to his family? NOPE. 

Dig a Grave to Dig Out a Ghost - Chapter 18

Original Title: 挖坟挖出鬼

Genres: Drama, Horror, Mystery, Supernatural, Yaoi

This translation is based on multiple MTLs and my own limited knowledge of Chinese characters. If I have made any egregious mistakes, please let me know.

Chapter Index

Chapter 18 - Memories

Lin Yan was afraid that the professor was going to run away. When the event was over, he didn't even take the time to change his clothes. He called over to little Daoist priest to tell him he could leave first, then rushed to the backstage lounge. The crowd trying to leave completely blocked the exit. Lin Yan wasn't able to get out for a while. Behind him was a swarm of school reporters, sweating profusely as they followed.

"Excuse me! Coming through!" He wasn't sure whose foot he stepped on in his rush, but the girl in front of him turned around and gave him a sharp look.

"Lin Yan!" a clear voice rang out. Lin Yan looked up and saw Weiwei standing at the door with a red staff badge hanging around her neck.

Lin Yan didn't care anymore about feeling embarrassed while he hurried through the crowd without any organized manner. He shouted at Weiwei: "Can you do me a favour? This is urgent!"

"It's my birthday next week, come over for dinner!" Weiwei shouted on her tiptoes.

"Okay, whatever, help stop the crowd behind me!"

Lin Yan ran as fast as he could straight down the corridor, stumbling from time to time over the hem of his clothes. When he burst into the backstage VIP room completely dishevelled, he realized that he had been worried for nothing. The professor hadn't planned on sneaking away at all. He was seated on the sofa and had waited for him, sipping his tea.

"You came? Sit down."

Lin Yan clutched his chest and nodded, breathing too heavily to speak.

The lounge was decorated in a very stylish way, with arc-shaped floor-to-ceiling French windows, beige wallpaper, and light brown soft leather sofas that looked like they were worth a lot of money. The school had always been willing to spend money on entertaining guests. The professor poured a glass of water for Lin Yan and pointed to the single-seater sofa opposite of him.

"You're Lin Yan, who came to us for an internship before, right? You performed well today. You've got guts and have a good mind." The professor pondered for a moment: "I thought you'd come find me sooner or later. I didn't expect that you would get back here so soon. "

"Do you know me?" A series of questions popped up in his mind. Lin Yan suppressed the urge to outright address his issue. He apologized for the outburst just then, and then said seriously: "I did here for that internship. This is very important to me, please tell me everything you know."

The professor nodded slightly: "I can probably guess what happened. So, I'll speak slowly. Listen carefully. If there's any useful information, I'll tell you." He sighed and looked out the window. He spoke softly: "The fact that you are still standing here in good shape is already much better than the person who came before you."

Lin Yan looked back at Xiao Yu, who was holding his hand tightly, standing ignorantly.

The floor-to-ceiling windows were facing the path outside the auditorium. The students must use this path to get to the dormitories. In the night, boys and girls walked down it together in large groups. I don’t know who yelled: "The river flows eastward, the stars in the sky look to the Big Dipper!*" The professor smiled, turned his face to Lin Yan, and recalled: "I was about the same age as you when I first entered the tomb. It was a good time to be young."

*(Song lyrics from "Hao Han Ge" by Liu Huan)

"Young people don't know what's important. . ."

The professor spoke very coherently, as if he had been wanted to say all this for many years. Lin Yan even felt that he was using this as an opportunity to reminisce about his nostalgic youth. But when the professor painted the scene back to Lin Yan, it sent a chill down Lin Yan's spine.

Twenty-five years ago, a group of coal miners in Jinxiang County accidentally collapsed a mineshaft while they were hacking away. They removed some jade plates and funerary wooden figurines from inside the hole, which turned out to be the entrance tunnel of an underground tomb. Once the county head official learned about this tomb, he blocked off the mausoleum and reported the news to the central government. At that time, China was still a novice in both archaeological technology and cultural relic preservation, and it was still difficult to excavate many imperial tombs. Therefore, this cultural Ming Dynasty tomb was handed over to the university, and a team of several master's students hired some local volunteers and rushed to Jinxiang.

This group of people included the professor and Lin Yan’s current supervisor. When preparing the materials for the tomb, the professor and Lin Yan both found some strange information. He strangely discovered that whether it were the county chronicles, the local chronicles, or genealogical records, there was no record of the tomb's owner. One of the workers on the team claimed to be a master of fengshui. After seeing the mausoleum, he said that it would be impossible to excavate. The earth's meridians formed a breeding ground for negative energy. The evil spirits attracted to the space were too dense to bury people. The owner of the tomb wouldn't be able to find peace after death. Not to mention the misfortune it would bring future generations. However, most of the students were young and energetic. They were eager to try after seeing the exquisitely carved jade artifacts. Without much consideration, they went directly to the tomb with tools and equipment.

"Strange events started after that." The professor adjusted his glasses and grimaced: "We should have listened to the warnings, but we didn't believe in evil at the time."

First, the four chickens brought to ward off evil spirits died overnight. When the underground tomb gate was opened, the scaffold collapsed, and an 18-year-old fell and broke his right hand. Everyone thought it was an accident, but from the time they entered the tomb, all those involved in the excavation had nightmares whenever they closed their eyes. Every night they dreamed that they were dying to the point that no one dared try to sleep anymore. Fatigue and constant fear made everyone’s fighting spirit die off after only a week.

"What happened after that?" Lin Yan looked back at Xiao Yu in surprise. He thought he had been tormented thoroughly by him, but he hadn't even seen half of this ghost's ferociousness yet.

"After entering the main chamber, we found many valuable cultural relics beside the coffin, but they were poorly preserved. We could only brush off the embroideries. Watching the treasures that we brought out so easily blacken and carbonize the moment the sunlight hit them was the fatal blow to our spirits. I cried miserably, but everyone was equally depressed and even fearful. No one had the energy to comfort me."

The professor's hand shifted on the windowpane, leaving behind a damp handprint. "There seemed to be some kind of energy in that tomb that could make people fall into despair. We worked hard and sang to make ourselves feel more brave, but it was still useless. A rural volunteer girl went crazy on the ninth morning and smashed her husband's head in with a machete while everyone could only stand in shock."

"Blood sprayed all over the bricks on the top of the tomb, and it was dripping everywhere. The woman put her husband's head in front of the blank memorial plaque, kowtowed three times, and sat on the ground convulsing, laughing eerily, while laughing and shouting a name." The professor looked at Lin Yan and asked, "Do you know what name it was?"

Lin Yan took a dazed step back. He wanted to break away from the hand holding his, but Xiao Yu held it tighter, not giving him a chance to escape.

"It was Xiao Yu. Who exactly is Xiao Yu? I searched through both the official and unofficial records, but I couldn't find any record that mentioned this name." The professor's expression became painful: "We gave the woman a consolation fee to settle the matter. After she took the money, she laughed for a while before she raised her machete and slashed it down across her neck. The blood was sprayed onto the memorial plaque. When she fell, only a thin piece of skin kept her head attached to her body. At that time, people didn't know much about archaeology. At first glance, some of the students were okay, but the hired volunteers were all scared away, saying that we dug up the grave of the dead, and this was retribution for it."

"The last person who left was the fengshui guy. He told me that the tomb had no fengshui. The owner of the tomb had died violently. Nothing could approach the tomb through the evil energy breeding ground. This resentment built up over a long time. The woman's body had been filled with too much Yin energy and she was the first to fall prey to the ghost."

"The man left. The students didn't want to go, but they were still having nightmares every time they. They tried to stick it out for a week before packing their bags and returning to school. No one else died. The first time the lead took over, he wouldn't even touch the coffin. It was a disappointment for everyone."

Lin Yan imagined the beheading. His face grew pale, and his stomach felt sick.

"Are you alright? You don't look well." The professor seemed to catch on to the younger's expression, and pointed to Lin Yan's cup: "Drink some water. Take a break then you can listen some more."

Lin Yan shook his head and asked, "Was it really like the fengshui master said?"

The professor hesitated for a while, and his fingers scribbled across a section of thin vapor he exhaled onto the glass. Two words appeared on the glass: "Xiao Yu." As if he didn't want to see it, the professor wiped it away and shook his head: "I have seen a lot of weird things throughout my career. The demon and ghost theory is not unfounded, but I think that the tomb might be some kind of spiritual formation. In ancient times, emperors and generals did everything they could to prevent their bodies from being destroyed. Many strange arts and techniques also emerged. It is possible that the woman was already delirious and so was the first to lose her mind in the consuming and the gloomy atmosphere in the tomb."

Lin Yan imagined the shadowy chamber with two headless bodies lying on the ground. He could barely squeeze out a wry smile: "What does this whole thing have to do with me?"

"I'm getting to that part." The professor sadly lowered his head: "Young people have never been willing to admit defeat. Since then, I've been very interested in the history of the Ming Dynasty Chenghua period. At first, I wanted to find out the identity of the tomb owner but I really fell in love with the history, and, 20 years later, I became an expert in the field. But long-term research in any field will encounter roadblocks. I was troubled by problem for nearly two months, and finally decided to go to the Ming Tomb again."

Lin Yan asked puzzledly: "Are you not afraid something will happen again?"

The professor shrugged: "No way, the large amount of untouched cultural relics inside was too tempting. The team left before anyone had even touched the coffin the last time I was there. I've never gotten over it."

"Be considerate of the obsessions of an old man who has been involved in academia for most of his life." The professor said: "When the newspaper published the news about the excavation of the Ming Tomb again, a message came from my secretary saying that someone was willing to help me. He understood fengshui. If something went wrong, I could turn to him."

"I'm not the same young man who spent a whole year studying about the tomb. I ran all over the country all day and night. I was too busy to take care of it, so I asked the secretary to keep in touch with him."

"Later on, something did happened. It was exactly the same as before. After entering the tomb door, everyone was inexplicably depressed and paranoid, and soon began to have nightmares. I was so afraid that the tragedy would happen again, so I had to ask the person who knew fengshui for help. He told me that I need to find a person who shares the same horoscope as the evil creature in order to make it stop. Then he gave me a birth date and said that he could find someone with the same birth date horoscope."

Lin Yan had already guessed the answer. He pointed at himself and hesitated to confirm: "Me?"

The professor nodded: "That birth year made me think of a student. I asked your supervisor. He said that he had a friend’s son who was looking for an internship, and his own student, Lin Yan. It was just an extreme coincident that your birthday fell onto the right date."

"You know what happened after that." The professor looked at the path outside the window. The students were almost all gone now. The moonlight didn't reach the path, instead only reflecting the black shadows of the trees that were swaying back and forth in the night breeze. "If you want to ask me who the owner of the tomb is, I can only tell you that I don't know. It's shameful; after more than 20 years, I have revisited this topic year after year, but I still haven't made any progress."

"If you have anything else to ask, please go ahead. As soon as you say the name 'Xiao Yu', I knew it was you. You've got a lot of guts to throw my things like that." The professor laughed, "I was just like that when I was young. I had trouble with authority back then. It took a lot to keep up with me."

Lin Yan hurriedly lowered his head and apologized. He kept thinking that it was this File Folder dragged him into this mess, but it didn't seem like he did it intentionally. . . How much did he know about what happened after? Thinking of this, Lin Yan raised his head and asked, "Don't you want to hear how I know Xiao Yu's name?"

The professor waved his hand and relaxed his expression: "People my age don't want to listen to these ghost and monster stories. It's bad luck. I know you're fine when I see you standing here. I didn't discuss it with you. I blame myself for not discussing this with you sooner. I'll try my best to explain anything you need, but the rest. . ." The professor said, spreading his hands, expressing that there was nothing he could do.

During their talk, the professor's personal secretary came in and urged him to leave, saying that the car was ready and the school officials were all waiting downstairs. The professor nodded to the secretary, turned around and asked Lin Yan, "Is there anything else you want to know?"

Lin Yan felt stuck. The most renowned Ming historians in China had no answers. Did he really have no choice but to wait out the three months, waiting for this ghost to remember his life experience and tell him his wish. But what he couldn't remember? Would Lin Yan be forced to accompany him for eternity as a ghost?

As he pondered, a thought popped up, like a small copper hammer hitting the glass with a crisp sound. Lin Yan stopped the professor who was packing up and asked: "You. . . you mentioned that the fengshui guy had mentioned a horoscope date. I happened to be looking for an internship at that time, so it all worked out, right?" Lin Yan's voice was trembling with excitement: "This is too much of a coincidence. It's almost like he was waiting for me. . . Where is he now? How did he know something would happen in the Ming Tomb?"

The professor suddenly stopped, frowning and thought it over: "You're right to be suspicious. At that time, I was busy planning the excavation and didn't care much about it. . ." The secretary who was waiting at the door shouted: " Xiao Liu, do you remember that fortune teller? Give me his contact information."

The young girl flipped through the folder in her arms, and replied: "That person never contacted me directly. He had been passing messages through a young guy who was new to the team. I'll look into it for you. I'll get back to you about in in the next few days."

The professor's face sank, and just like Lin Yan, he had no answer. He whispered to him: "It'll should be easy to track him down." He patted Lin Yan on the shoulder: "I'll help you out with this, don't worry. "He took out a pen and left Lin Yan's his phone number, and the corner of his mouth ticked up: "I still owe you your prize. I'll give it to you the next time we meet."

When he left, the crowd was gone. The corridor was empty. The old custodian didn’t even turn on the ceiling light to save electricity. Only the wall lamp glowed a dull yellow. Lin Yan’s face drained of all colour. He suddenly felt like he was in a horror movie. He was the lead actor stumbling along the wall in a terrifying corridor.

The professor's story made him feel incredibly afraid. Behind him was a ghost, a murderer who put people to death in a cruel and bloody way. He didn't even dare to look behind him. He was afraid that when he turned around, a ghost covered in bloodstains would be there, grinning sinisterly at him through a veil of long hair, saying: It's your turn.

Lin Yan's breathing became heavier and heavier. When he couldn't resist the urge to run away, he was suddenly pushed harshly against the wall. His body was wrenched around. Lin Yan raised his head and squeezed his eyes shut.