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potahun · 6 months

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Mysterious Lotus Casebook and the Analogies to Being Queer

this is not breaking new grounds or anything, there seems to be broad consensus in the (tumblr) fandom that LHL is a lot about being queer. there is also this brilliant meta by @seventh-fantasy about the jianghu being a queer space, which i love, and which dealt with the gender perspective for li lianhua in particular

having that in mind, i want to say how much i love that li lianhua and fang duobing's stories feel like analogies to two different queer experiences

we see li xiangyi in a few flashbacks and in how others viewed him before the east sea battle 10 years ago. we know he became the n°1 swordsman in the world, established a para-judiciary system and order in an otherwise lawless jianghu, that he used to duel just to win the right to pick flowers from someone's garden as gifts for every single lady in the sigu sect, and that he dated qiao wanmian and intended to marry her (judging by that flashback where he's seen drinking with shan gudao and the boys)

a lot of it is very heteronormative, and even a bit performative. and i don't want to say it's not genuine, i actually rly like the idea that many of those actions felt perfectly real to him at the time, and i genuinely think he had that show-off streak in him when he was a teenager

but regardless, everything about li xiangyi follows the heteronormative expectations of society, including his achievements, which command, among other things, admiration for his fighting prowess and his ability to establish rules. which is of course, ironic, as pointed out in the meta referenced above, since the jianghu itself does not follow those rules (and we slowly learn in the story that there was criticism of him for this even in-story).

but then we get to li lianhua, who does not fight, but cooks, learned to sew, to plant flowers, turns down every lady who looks his way, and who does not interfere in jiang hu matters if he can help it. and in particular, we get the conversation he has with qiao wanmian in ep 18, where she confronts him about his identity and asks him:

"if you'd already come back, why did you never reunite with us?"

and his reply is:

"all of this is so far in the past, now. i'm very tired. i just want to be free."

li lianhua is constantly put in contrast with li xiangyi. where li xiangyi performs, li lianhua just exists in the jianghu. where li xiangyi fulfils expectations and surpasses them, li lianhua turns his back to expectations. where li xiangyi establishes a domain and protects, li lianhua wanders freely, all by himself. where li xiangyi conforms to heteronormative standards, li lianhua doesn't.

we know that li lianhua is an unreliable narrator in that his opinion on his own past is biased, his knowledge incomplete. and he lies. almost compulsively. but there are also truth bombs that he drops between the lies. i personally believe that his willingness to detach himself from all the expectations thrown upon him and to finally exist away from norms, is part of those truths.

and this is very close to a type of queer experience, where you come out of some event or another in your twenties, suddenly realise you're queer and oh my god, it's time to live differently. and you start rejecting the norms and maybe your old friends wonder what got into you.

in the same conversation in ep 18, the following exchange happens between li lianhua and qiao wanmian:

LLH: "when we met each other, I was young and ignorant. I didn't understand what the feelings i felt for you were, either." QWM: "what do you mean? are you saying... you never loved me?" LLH: "back then, we were young. nothing of what we said then can still count now."

it can be interpreted in different ways, but it sure fits a queer narrative extremely well. the feelings were real, but he didn't understand whether they were romantic or not, he just followed the norms. but things are different now.

enters fang duobing

fang duobing feels like a different queer narrative. by family background, fang duobing is a person who has equal ties to the imperial court as he does to the jiang hu. the emperor and his family wants to engage him to the princess of the court, a perfectly normal thing in the societal context he lives in, and a luck few can hope to have. what does he do?

flee

i often joke that fang duobing's sexuality is to be a detective on the jianghu, but it really does feel like that kind of narrative. fang duobing never has any doubt that his place is away from the rules of the imperial court. In ep. 1, he tells his servants:

don't worry. once your young master makes a name for himself as a renown detective on the jianghu, they {his parents} will understand that, compared to the imperial court, i am much more suited for the jiang hu.

and yes, this is about escaping the rigidity of the court as such, but it's also analogous for the freedom to be who you are, to be queer, to not conform.

and fang duobing never backtracks. his parents want him to conform, and they want him to have the comfort that comes with this lifestyle. he rejects it thoroughly and consistently.

it's also interesting that in ep 25, once they meet the princess and they have gone through a case together, fang duobing still rejects the idea of the wedding. when li lianhua tells him "the jianghu is a place full of grudges and sinister schemes. why not become a carefree consort prince?"

fang duobing only looks forlorn and retorts "li lianhua, can you never say that again, please?"

in contrast, though, he has no qualms planning his whole life on the jianghu with li lianhua in ep. 15. so this is not about settling down with someone.

it feels very close to being confidently queer and knowing it from a very early age, and then rejecting the heteronormative expectations thrown upon you with assurance.

...

anyway, so what i want to say is: li lianhua is a tired millenial who discovered he was queer in his mid-twenties after a mild depression; fang duobing is a gen-z baby queer who doesn't know his queer history but is so confidently queer and he's never looking back

#fang duobing #li lianhua #lhl #mysterious lotus casebook #meta #lhl meta #mlc meta #mlcb #mlc #li xiangyi

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eirenical · 7 months

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Mysterious Lotus Casebook | Lian Hua Lou | 莲花楼 | Episode 10

"Since you have been poisoned with the deadliest poison, no poison can harm you anymore."

--Monk Wuliao

I've been thinking a lot about this line lately, and its potential repercussions. In context, this is Li Lianhua remembering Monk Wuliao's words from when he was healed as much as he could have been from the Bicha Poison 10 years ago. Shortly before these remembered words, there is a flashback wherein it is revealed that Li Xiangyi had a nut allergy that made him break out in hives. That bowl of food he's eating is a nut porridge brought to him by Yun Biqiu. (There are less dangerous ways to see if this person is your former sect leader, Biqiu! O_o;;;) Anyway, as he is eating this nut porridge, and remembering this line, Li Lianhua is distinctly NOT breaking out in hives.

The conclusion that we are clearly supposed to draw is that the Bicha Poison has prevented the "toxin" of the nuts from harming its host.

...but why stop there?

If a nut is a poison for the purpose of this mechanism of action, then what about other drugs/medications? After all, to quote one of my favorite sayings: "Healers and poisoners are folks with similar skill sets and wildly different philosophies." Or to put it as I learned it in my toxicology class in vet school: "All medicines are poisons at the right dose."

So if a nut can be a poison, then medications CERTAINLY are. And if the Bicha poison recognizes the nut as a poison and prevents it from acting, then we can assume it would do the same to any medications.

That explains why Medicine Demon's priceless potions DON'T WORK.

That explains why the snake bites DON'T WORK.

That explains why Guan Hemeng's medicines DON'T WORK.

It also explains why Li Lianhua is so convinced that Fan Duobing's pill from Tianji Hall and Di Feisheng's Wangchuan Flower WON'T work.

Because once you've been poisoned by Bicha Poison, NO OTHER POISON WILL HARM YOU... or help you.

And taking that a step further, it means that every time Li Lianhua has been sick or injured or in need of pain medication in the past ten years, NONE OF IT WOULD HAVE WORKED. And considering how much more fragile he is now than he used to be, that absolutely breaks my heart.

Just imagine that every time he was ill or injured, he had to weigh the benefits of using Yangzhouman to heal himself versus the risk of using too much and shrinking the time he had left even more. How many times must he have chosen to just power through and hope he makes it to the other side? No wonder he's so reluctant to let Guan Hemeng examine him and try to help. No wonder he doesn't want to waste everyone else's precious medications on himself. He knows they'll do nothing.

...excuse me while I go cry in a corner now. TT^TT

#mysterious lotus casebook #li lianhua #li xiangyi #monk wuliao #mlcb meta #eirenical.meta #lianhua lou #lian hua lou #莲花楼

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eirenical · 2 months

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Mysterious Lotus Casebook | Lian Hua Lou | 莲花楼 | Episodes 3 & 9 - The Letter

There is so much we don't know about what happened ten years ago between Sigumen and Jinyuanmeng. A lot of it gets unraveled as the show goes on, but one thing remains true: there is a hell of a lot of unreliable narration to pick through to get to the truth. And when it comes to the particular truths of what happened between the individual people involved, that becomes even more true.

And one of the little mysteries that always bothered me was this letter that Qiao Wanmian wrote to Li Xiangyi to break up with him. Because I absolutely could not figure out when he actually got that letter. Anyway, I finally caught a few details that helped me to tease that apart and my first realization was that he fucking LEFT HER ON 'READ' for about a month (Li XIangyi, PLEASE OTZ) and the second realization was that we get two different versions of these events YET AGAIN, but this time both from Li Xiangyi's POV in flashbacks, and I'm CHEWING GLASS OVER IT, so naturally I have to share.

So the first time we get this particular flashback is in episode 3. Li Lianhua is remembering the aftermath of the Donghai Battle, how he fell into the ocean and washed up on the shore... a husk of what he had once been.

He wakes up and makes his way into town and to Sigumen's steps, overhearing all this terrible news as he walks. People injured, homes destroyed, people killed, and so much of the blame being placed on all the sects, and on Sigumen in particular. And as he walks, you can see it all starting to weigh him down, until he's literally bent over from the weight of it on his back.

And then the final betrayal. His people, his friends, want to disband the sect. They want to walk away. They blame him and his hubris for this disaster. And the coup-de-grace is Xiao Zijin asking Qiao Wanmian... "You don't like this place either, right?"

And the sad look on Qiao Wanmian's face finally breaks Li XIangyi of his paralysis and he turns away, back to the scene unfolding on those steps and drifts back to the shore, where he ultimately collapses.

And that's all we get.

We know he returned to Sigumen. We know he overheard them wanting to disband the sect. We know he left without a word. And that's the end of the story as far as Episode 3 is concerned.

But this makes sense. Li LIanhua is mid-Bicha attack and has just left Fang Duobing on the side of the road when this flashback comes on. He's fighting his own body in a desperate bid for survival to complete the one task he's set himself and Fang Duobing has just dredged up all this stuff and gone off on a tear about how he's Li Xiangyi's disciple. A road Li Xiangyi never got a chance to walk. Another person he failed along the way. And so he's focused on all the ways in which he is a failure in that moment, all the ways he doesn't live up to Fang Duobing's hero, Li XIangyi, all the ways that he is no longer that man. So he zeroes in on the moment he lost it all: his reputation, his sect, his health, his power. So that's the part of the flashback that we get.

But in Episode 9, we have an entirely different set of circumstances. He's just saved his A-mian. He's focused on helping her let go of the man he thinks she still loves. He's putting himself aside to focus solely on her (or so he thinks—that's honestly a question for later, but bear with me, we'll get there ;D) and what she needs. And we get dumped into this flashback again.

Only this time it doesn't start on the beach. It starts here:

It starts with Li Xiangyi seeing his sect disbanded again. Only this time, he remembers the words that come from Xiao Zijin differently:

There's no speaking out load of "you hate it here too, don't you?" or any similar sentiment. Because at this point, Li Lianhua knows this isn't true. She can't hate it there. She lives there. She didn't leave. And she doesn't hate him because she very obviously misses him and mourns him. So in his mind, he gives this moment a little less abrasiveness. A little less fierceness. But because he's so focused on A-Mian in this memory, we finally find out that there is an entire piece to this incident that we haven't gotten until now.

A-Mian's grief.

A-Mian's recognition that he was there.

And the letter.

The letter she wrote a month ago.

A letter Li Xiangyi NEVER READ.

We get to see A-Mian's regret. We get to see her grief: both for her own sense of shame at being unable to keep up with the man she loved, and her sense of loss over her own innocence and the opportunities that they'll never have now to make amends. And we get to see her break from her grief for just a moment to rush down those stairs because some instinct in her just won't quit.

Li Xiangyi had returned.

And she knew.

But it was too late. She no longer trusted herself. And Li Xiangyi, having heard her outpouring of grief, had already decided that he owed it to her and to everyone else to just… walk out of their lives for good.

And he did.

But he owed her one last thing first.

He owed it to her to read the letter that she'd written him a month ago and he'd never opened.

So before he goes back to that beach, he returns to his rooms in Sigumen to retrieve that unopened letter and read it.

On first watch, I had assumed this was after his healing with Monk Wuliao. That he was RE-reading that letter, not reading it for the first time. But these are clearly his rooms in Sigumen. The desk he conducts business from is at the bottom right and the table he confronts Shand Gudao from is on the left. But unlike when we usually see these rooms, brightly lit during the day, they're now mostly in darkness, the sun clearly setting given the angle of the light coming into the room. This is the sunset of Li Xiangyi. The last moments of his life, in a way.

And the letter is very VERY obviously unopened when he first takes it out:

And reading that letter is the final nail in Li Xiangyi's coffin, I think. Final proof that he'd failed in every aspect of his life: being a brother, being a lover, being a sect leader, being a friend, being a student. After this, he leaves Sigumen and goes back to that beach to lay down where he washed back up initially, ready to let the death he temporarily escaped take him away. And when the monk saves his life anyway, he still manages to kill off the part of him that was Li Xiangyi. Li Xiangyi is dead, he insists over and over and over again, until he believes it himself.

Because in that letter—a letter he left unread FOR A MONTH—Qiao Wanmian manages to show him that he never really saw her at all. That he never saw one of his dearest loved ones in pain right in front of him—pain that he finally witnessed on the steps of Sigumen as she poured out her grief and regret in sending this letter to begin with. How ironic then, that a letter she'd sent intending to set him free of her to fly up to the heights on his own, was the final arrow that brought him down. I don't think that's what she would have wanted at all.

But I really feel for her. I do.

Just imagine sending this letter and knowing that it's sitting in Li Xiangyi's mail pile somewhere… and assuming that he read it and that's what spurred him on to this last desperate fight. Because in that outpouring on the steps that clearly what she thought she did. She thought this letter sent him to his death. And in that moment she's wrong, because HE NEVER READ IT. Not until long after that. Not until after this moment. And fucking HELL, but that just hurts me.

Maybe it wouldn't have changed anything if he hadn't witnessed that moment. Maybe it wouldn't have changed anything if he hadn't read that letter. Maybe he still would have felt that he'd failed enough to warrant death of some kind.

But maybe not.

I guess we'll never know.

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eirenical · 9 months

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I’ve been thinking a lot about Fang Duobing and names.

(Disclaimer: I’m learning Mandarin but have very very little of it under my belt and have pulled these definitions from Yabla. If I’ve missed a major nuance, please feel free to add on. ^_^)

He’s first introduced to us as 袁健康 (Yuan Jiankang), the alias he gives at Baichuan Court when he’s participating in the tests to get accepted. 健康 means health or healthy. And when you consider his actual name, that’s... telling.

Fang Duobing (方多病), we find out not much later, is his real name. But it’s not really a name, is it? It’s what his mother and father and aunt called him as a child because he was 多病 -- often/always ill. Much later in the series, we hear from his father that his mother didn’t give him a proper name at the beginning because they weren’t sure he would make it.

The only other name he ever gets called is Fang Xiaobao (方小宝). He’s called this by his mother and aunt and eventually by Li Lianhua, as well (at first, I think this is almost ironic or teasing in nature, but becomes sincere as they come to mean more to each other, but I’ll get to that). 小宝 means “little treasure”. This is the same 宝 as in 宝贝 (baobei). From what I understand it’s the kind of affectionate pet name that parents might call their children, but isn’t... really the kind of nickname you’d use for an adult. (...unless you’re Zhao Yunlan and have absolutely zero shame and are kind of a horn dog. XD)

And this progression just fascinates me and makes me feel endlessly sad for him. He’s “always ill” to everyone he’s introduced to because he never was given a proper name. He’s “healthy” when he’s trying to break away from his family’s control and his entire past to follow his own dreams in the jianghu and Baichuan Court. And he is forever “little treasure” to his mother and his aunt who wanted nothing more than to keep him safe and coddled at home because they can’t imagine him no longer being the “always sick” child he was when he was young.

And to Li Lianhua, he starts out as Fang Duobing because that’s the only name that he knows him by, but over the course of the series that shifts. He starts calling him “Xiaobao” eventually. And at first it’s said teasingly and not in the nicest of ways. It’s a little condescending. A reminder of how young, how innocent, Fang Duobing is. A constant subtle suggestion that he should maybe go home to his mother, marry his princess, and live a safe and comfortable life. But the more he accepts Fang Duobing’s presence in his life and the connection that’s building between them, once he hears Fang Duobing call him 知己 (zhiji) and MEAN IT, once Fang Duobing starts stepping up and living up to his potential as an equal and a partner... that shifts. It becomes less ironic, less teasing, and far, FAR more sincere. More of an acknowledgement of how much Fang Duobing has come to mean to him, even if he can never put that into words.

...but it’s still not a name.

The Emperor calls his father out on this towards the end of the series and for a moment I thought we might see him given a real name at that point, and I was almost relieved when it didn’t happen. If he’s going to get a “real” name at this point, I’d rather see it be one he picks for himself or one given to him by someone who loves and understands him in ways he deserves.

So he makes his way through this story named only as a testimony to how other people feel about him: a sickly child who may be a burden, may never live up to expectations, may not live long enough to be worth naming; a treasured child who survived and, against all odds, THRIVED, but needs to be protected at all costs; a vibrant youth who’s one shot to name himself is to deny his entire past and leave it behind him... and eventually to being a treasure again, but no longer one that needs to be coddled. One that truly IS a treasure and an unexpected one: a legacy, a partner, a support strong enough for someone who refuses to rely on anyone’s strength but his own.

And that makes sense. Because at the core of it, Fang Duobing is a people pleaser. Once he finds someone he feels strongly about, he’ll do whatever he can, be whoever he needs to be, to make that person happy, to protect them. And with the way he shapes his own personality to suit those goals, he’s more of a chameleon than Li Lianhua ever was. And his lack of a real name reflects that beautifully.

...and now I’m going to go sit in a corner and cry about it some more. TT^TT

#mysterious lotus casebook #fang duobing #names #eirenical.meta #mysterious lotus casebook meta #mlcb meta #long post #just in case #fang duobing & li lianhua #fang duobing x li lianhua #could go either way #fanghua

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eirenical · 8 months

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Mysterious Lotus Casebook | Lian Hua Lou | 莲花楼 | Episode 5

Poor thing. None of the people she loved loved her. And none of them wanted to leave her alive.

[Do not repost. Do not remove caption. Thank you!]

Gif IDs and meta babble under the cut.

[ID: Three gifs of Li Lianhua from episode 5 of Mysterious Lotus Casebook. He is shown from mid-chest up in the first gif and from the shoulders up in the last two. He is speaking of the murder victim in the case they are investigated (text in the main post). He looks a little sad, also a bit resigned. There is a brief cut in the first gif to Fang Duobing looking equally sad.]

So this rewatch is going... SO WELL. I keep finding these ridiculous parallels in places I don't expect to find them and losing my entire damned mind about it. This episode struck me the first time as existing mostly to establish that LLH is, in fact, a good detective. He's wily as hell and has the knowledge to back it up. It's also the avenue by which we're introduced to the Jinyuan Alliance and some of the other side players that come back later on. But I didn't think much of the mystery itself. Of the parallels that are going to be drawn later on.

Yu Qiushang died twice, victim to the people who supposedly loved her most, because she was in the way. Because it was too dangerous to leave her alive with the things she knew.

...kind of like Li Xiangyi.

Only it wasn't about what he knew, it was about who he was. He was inconvenient, and too righteous to be left alive to interfere. And he, too, was killed multiple times over the course of the story:

Once by Jiao Liquiao and Yun Biqiu with teh Bicha Poison.

Twice by Di Feisheng over the Eastern Sea.

Thrice by Xiao Zijin and the rest of Sigu Sect when they disbanded the Sect rather than try to rebuild.

And one final time when Shan Gudao set out to destroy his legacy and reputation.

All people he loved (yes, I'm counting Di Feisheng in that category, fight me ^_^). All people who didn't (or at least who he thought didn't) love him back in the same way. All people who betrayed him.

And if you watch that last gif: there's a breath that gets punched out of him; that hitch before he says those final words; that twist to his features like he's just now seeing this parallel himself.

This one hit home.

And then to find Di Feisheng in the back mountain so soon after when he's helpless to confront him? The way his fist clenches because he's practically DRIVEN by the need to do SOMETHING... but he can't. He isn't strong enough. He's hurt. It would be suicide.

But this case has brought all of that roaring to the surface and he's not ready for it.

It's no wonder he passes out.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have an appointment to go cry in a corner about this man YET AGAIN. 😭🥺😭

#mysterious lotus casebook #li lianhua #yu qiushuang #parallels #li xiangyi #eirenical.gifs #eirenical.meta #mlcb meta #DON'T MIND ME #I'LL JUST BE OVER HERE CRYING #AGAIN #and i have more coming #but i think i'm done fighting with gifs for the day #XD

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eirenical · 9 months

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Mysterious Lotus Casebook | Lian Hua Lou | 莲花楼 | Episode 13

"Li Xiangyi wasn't always right. I'm older than you. I've heard a lot about him. When he was young, he was very petulant. The downfall of the Sigu Sect was partly his fault." -Li Lianhua on Li Xiangyi, Mysterious Lotus Casebook Episode 19

[Do not repost. Do not remove caption. Thank you!]

Bonus:

You know the drill (or maybe you don't if you're new? *waves*)… all my thoughts and images descriptions behind the cut:

[Above the text are five gifs depicting a mildly heated conversation between Li LIanhua and Fang Duobing from episode 13 of Mysterious Lotus Casebook. Li Lianhua has just revealed that "A-Fei" is Di Feisheng, the leader of the Jinyuan Alliance. Fang Duobing is upset and demands to know what Li Lianhua could have to do with him. Li Lianhua explains that Di Feisheng wants him to save someone, but that Li Lianhua doesn't want to save this person. Fang Duobing goes on to say that Li Lianhua shouldn't save this person, because he must be a bad person if Di Feisheng wants him saved. Li Lianhua agrees that this person is a bad person and that he won't save him, that it's more important to save Fang Duobing now. Bonus gifs show Fang Duobing protesting that he is talented and might have felt a bit funny before but he's fine now... and then promptly passes out. Li Lianhua rushes to his side.]

First of all, the entirely of episode 13 drove me completely feral in so many ways I still can't put it concisely into words. But the core of it sits right here in this exchange. There is so much evidence in the first 12 episodes that Li Lianhua doesn't really care if he lives or dies or, at the very least, that he's resigned himself to dying, but this is the first time we see him say outright that not only doesn't he care if he dies, but that he, in fact, WANTS to die.

"He asked me to promise him to save someone. [...] There are people in this world who can only be saved by me. Unfortunately, I don't want to save them."

After this episode, we know that there is only one person that Di Feisheng wants to save. And that's Li Xiangyi. And here he is admitting out loud that he doesn't want to be saved. That he wants to die. And moments later, he agrees with Fang Duobing that this person Di Feisheng wants saved is a bad person. That he is a bad person. And you can see it in his face that he wholeheartedly believes it. He's said as much before. Every time he talks to Fang Duobing about Li Xiangyi, he paints him in the worst light possible. Everyone else gets the benefit of the doubt in his stories, except himself.

His self esteem is in the toilet, he blames himself for most of the things that went wrong 10 years ago, and he actively wants to die.

And that paints Di Feisheng's desperate need to save his life and Fang Duobing's equally desperate need to save Li Xiangyi's character and legacy in such a poignant light. They both want to save him in their own ways, but Li Lianhua is right: the only person who CAN save him is himself. Because without that will to live, without that willingness to forgive himself, then no matter what either of them does, he isn't going to go along with it.

But the thing that really truly breaks me in all this is that IT STARTS TO WORK.

Just a few episodes after this, Di Feisheng steps in to save his secret identity, all but begging Li Lianhua to let him help, and Li Lianhua AGREES. And in the aftermath, when he's suffering, Di Feisheng steps in to feed him spiritual energy to heal him in whatever small way he can against the poison and Li Lianhua allows that, too. And you can see in so many of these little ways that his attitude is starting to shift, just a little. That maybe he's starting to entertain the idea that he could live. Because Di Feishing has enough will to live for both of them and he's not afraid to keep applying it like a baseball bad against Li Lianhua's suicidal ideation.

And then we have Fang Duobing. The quote below the gifset is from episode 19, and once again we have Li Lianhua tearing down Li XIangyi's character. But Fang Duobing isn't going to stand for that.

FDB: Someone said that to me before, but I've studied him. He should be proud of himself! LLH: There's a fine line between proud and arrogant. "Arrogant" is not a good word. FDB: He was proud because he had faith. Faith is a great word. No one is perfect. Neither was he. There are shadows wherever there is light. Yes. Maybe Li Xiangyi was too proud. But he established the Sigu Sect to make the jianghu a better place where the strong didn't prey on the weak. Look at those guys. They're just a bunch of selfish posers! LLH: If Li Xiangyi knew that someone could understand him so well ten years later, he'd be very glad.

He ALSO has enough faith for both of them. Li Xiangyi would be very glad... and Li Lianhua is very glad. You can see him in that moment, testing his weight against the possibility that maybe, just maybe, even though he wasn't perfect, he wasn't as bad as he believed himself to be. Maybe there was some good in him. Maybe it wasn't all in vain. Maybe he does deserve at least a little forgiveness.

And that push and pull between Di Feisheng and Fang Duobing should, by all rights, be acting like a tug of war to pull Li Lianhua apart. But it doesn't. It's pulling them all forward. Towards healing. Especially Li Lianhua. And he's not there yet. It's still going to take time. But the seeds of it are being planted. And we have so many more episodes still to go and I have no doubt things will go pear-shaped at some point, but to go from this *points up at gifset* to tentative healing in a matter of 6 episodes? That's huge. And I'm so happy he has them both. TT^TT

#mysterious lotus casebook #莲花楼 #li lianhua #li xiangyi #di feisheng #fang duobing #di feisheng & fang duobing & li lianhua #eirenical.gifs #eirenical.meta #mlcb meta #I AM GOING TO BE CRYING ABOUT THESE GUYS FOR A WHILE #DON'T MIND ME #😭😭😭😭😭#warning: suicidal ideation #spoilers #mlcb spoilers #through episode 19 or so

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eirenical · 9 months

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Mysterious Lotus Casebook | Episode 30

These screenshots are terrible, so I'm not going to bother editing them, but can we talk about the fact that Fang Duobing's mother INVENTED A CAR???

There are no horses here. All those gears in the back are what propel it forward, I think?

He Xiaohui's Cloud-Chasing Carriage IS A CAR.

She invented that.

She built that.

Episode 30 really is the gift that keeps on giving. 😍😍😍

(Also, I'm doubling down now on wanting a spinoff series all about her. I think I'm in love. 😍)

#mysterious lotus casebook #he xiaohui #cloud chasing carriage #mlcb meta #...sort of?#at least a little #XD #i swear i'll get properly past episode 30 eventually #i HAVE watched episode 31 #and it was also really good in many many ways #but episode 30 just grabbed me by the fucking throat with giving me EVERYTHING I WANTED AND THEN SOME #and i keep getting dragged back to it in spite of my best intentions #😂😂😂#eirenical.screencaps #eirenical.meta

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eirenical · 4 months

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2023 Tumblr Top 10

I’m sure to no one’s surprise, 8 of my 10 top posts this year were Mysterious Lotus Casebook meta, gifsets, or fic. XD The other two were about the Bishop from Les Mis, which got a double kick because I did this after his first chapter in the Brick readalong came up again this year and... a very personal post that I didn’t want to shove in people’s faces again so I took it off the end.

Anyway, I just wanted to take this moment to thank the MLCB fandom, because this is the most interaction (and by that I mean genuine conversation not just reblogs and likes) I’ve had with people in fandom in a long time and I have been having so much fun with you guys. I have more fic and more meta (and if I have the energy, more gifsets) planned for this fandom in 2024, so stick around and by all means, come talk to me. ;D

1. 204 notes - Oct 13 2023