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#{Huaxiu Headcanon
arcxnumvitae · 1 month
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While her father, the former emperor, was still alive, almost no one paid any attention to Minglian. Literally. Her father didn't care a whit about the second girl child, not when he had his perfect heir. What use was she beyond marrying off to a distant royal family for political ties one day? The emperor's lack of interest in his daughter thus influenced the rest of the Tengmen court, because what was there to gain in trying to earn the affection of the forgotten princess? Truthfully, many nobles tittered to each other about the embarrassing nature of her pitiful plight-- a princess who theoretically should have everything in the world, left in the corner.
It was only because her older brother took her care into his hands that she had servants, clothes, and her household was kept in order. It was him who would request funds from their father for Minglian's sake and who would see to her servants and the like.
The attitude only changed as Huaxiu grew older and it became clear that the future emperor cared for his sister and wouldn't tolerate any making a mockery of her. Slowly, the court began to acknowledge her more after the passing of the former emperor, though it still rings very hollow to Minglian's ears.
Because of the way the court viewed her, few ever take her seriously in her pursuits, be it her demands to learn swordplay or otherwise. She was often turned away by chuckling guards and captains. It would be easy to tell her brother and have them be made to teach her, but Minglian, already feeling she was enough of a burden on her brother, didn't want to. Besides, how would it look if she ran crying to her brother every time?
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arcxnumvitae · 3 months
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Spicy Royal AU fact too, the Emperor has had numerous lovers in the past. He particularly enjoyed being lavished in gifts and praise and indulging in the pretty thing of the moment that caught his attention. He did end up gaining a reputation for being a playboy because of it, and many said he was similar to his father in that way.
The sleeping around has mostly stopped since taking the throne and becoming essentially the full-time caretaker of his younger sister.
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arcxnumvitae · 4 months
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Ever since they were young, the little prince took it upon himself to make sure that the princess was cared for, despite still being a child himself. He felt that he had to, since his father paid the princess no mind and would have done nothing to see to her care and upkeep. So, Huaxiu learned from an early age how to manage a household, hire and dismiss servants, allocate funds, and the like. The emperor at least never forbade him doing so, mainly because he didn't care.
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arcxnumvitae · 4 months
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Minglian's first language was Mandarin Chinese and she can understand most of the main dialects. From there, she learned English and is currently studying Japanese, Korean, and a few other languages. One thing native Chinese speakers might notice though, is that Minglian speaks oddly in a manner that none would quite be able to place.
That's because she's picked up the older, ancient, spoken dialect that the older dragons around her still use to this day. It's a little humorous for the dragons to watch their youngest speak in such an antiquated way. And a little confusing whenever she incorporates the modern slang that she knows.
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arcxnumvitae · 5 months
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Huaxiu was handed the reigns to the Tengmen Empire approximately five years ago. His ascension came after the unexpected death of the previous emperor after battling with a sudden illness.
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arcxnumvitae · 5 months
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The newly-crowned ruler of the Tengmen empire.
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Her Imperial Highness, the Emperor's younger sister.
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The "prince" of a kingdom recently added to the Tengmen empire.
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The Emperor's council.
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arcxnumvitae · 13 days
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1. What does your muse smell like?
Primarily jasmine with an undercurrent of flour and herbs.
2. What do your muse’s hands feel like?
Almost soft if not for the callouses wear his sword fits into his grip. Other than practicing his swordplay he’s lived the life of a rich young, pampered man.
3. What does your muse usually eat in a day?
It varies since he doesn’t have to eat, so sometimes meals would be “skipped” in favor of doing other things. He’s at least gotten more regular since he’s taken to cooking for his student (another person who also don’t have to eat...) but whenever he eats it’s usually something rather nice. Since he’s Chinese, generally cuisine along those lines. Luxurious especially if he’s eating out. He’s not very picky with his palate either when it comes to food.
4.  Does your muse have a good singing voice?
Oh absolutely! He only really sings or hums unconsciously when he’s cleaning, cooking, or doing any kind of household work though.
5. Does your muse have any bad habits or nervous ticks?
A perfectionist to a T. A bit of a neat freak too, if he’s somewhere where things are out of place or messy then it will take everything within him not to start cleaning up right then and there. Cleans when he’s stressed. Bites down on his lip when upset. Honestly, I love him to bits but he can be a bit of a mess sometimes.
6. What does your muse usually look like/wear?
Dressed to the nines, the whole nine yards. Solid colors. A darker, usually black, color scheme. Expensive designer clothes. Not a hair out of place. He’s also a sucker for beautiful embroidery and so his robes have a bit more color and flare to them, but in generally he always looks perfectly put together.
7. Is your muse affectionate? How much? How so?
Once upon a time I would have said no, but Minglian's appearance in his life has changed him to be a kinder and more affectionate man. That's only with Minglian though, depending on the circumstances and the person is where it starts to vary. He also has this sense of propriety that generally keeps him from acting super affectionate even with people he's now closer to, like some of the other dragons. Then there's also the trauma and all.
8. What position does your muse sleep in?
I always imagined it on his side facing the left and slightly curled up and hands pillowed under him. It’s an oddly cute sleeping position for him. 
9. Could you hear your muse in the hallway from another room?
Unless it’s in his home, where I feel like his voice does get a bit louder just because it’s his private place, probably not? Maybe? He speaks at a pretty normal tone unless of course he’s being agitated or teased (by Meihui or Zhaohui).
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arcxnumvitae · 10 months
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Who/What inspired my muses
Part 2 babbyyyy I’m sufferinnggg!
Arata: More elf underground shenanigan tomfoolery. Also tying in some backstories for funsies with Val playing a big role in a pivotal moment. A muse I fully intended to have die! For some reason my friends took issue with that!
Katarina: I saw Kirei ( @thewolfisawake) make a fun looking institution and I wanted to stick my big meaty claws alllllllll in it. I asked her, all shy and shit, if I could make a Bastion muse too and she graciously allowed me to do so. Of course I had to make Katarina a half-elf. 
Emil: I thought it’d be fun to make a muse from Katarina’s human side of the family, the one her mom was estranged from. Kirei had included in her blurbs how some older families of the Bastion were still anti-supernatural creatures so I thought it would be an interesting thing to explore further in a muse, but since Katarina was separated from all of that...
Dawn: I looked at how I’d fridged William’s dead girlfriend in his backstory just for the sake of giving him angst and feelings and I really didn’t like that I’d done that! So I decided to flesh out Dawn as a person. Which led to me going to my friends and saying, “Y’all, this muse is deader than a doornail in his backstory, I can’t bring her back, right?!” And then I brought her back. This was when I started to firmly put my foot in fun Greek myth stuff and let my PJO kid flag fly by straight up incorporating Aphrodite into the mix.
Xiaodan: uh. dragon. dragon searching for Jianhuren. Searching with another dragon.
Meihui: uh. other dragon. other dragon searching for Jianhuren. drogon. They actually were made earlier, around Qingshan, pushed to being side muses, and then re-added as main muses around this time when Kirei petitioned for it.
Huaxiu: Hey, same mangaka, he looks like Qingshan-- oh baby we can make some lore from this. This is really where Red Eyes as a concept started to get cemented, a smooth, uh, 2-3 years after I first added Jianhuren, ahahaa. It was also shortly after Huaxiu that I created Zhaohui as a side muse so we were really chugging along the dragon train at that time.
Luiz: No clue. Truly, no idea. I think I just wanted to mash a bunch of different mythological creature facets together and see what I got. I know the inspiration for the gorgon blood he was infused with came from Kirei because her muse Crowe has gorgon blood.
Cornelius: What if I made a family member from the Texas side of Dawn’s family that she had never been in contact with? What if he looked like her dad too in a way to make her force her feelings and her grief? Cornelius truly was made actually as basically to circle around Dawn’s ongoing story, haha. 
Raven: ‘I know it doesn’t make sense, but what if Thanatos had a kid.’ How would that type of godly parentage manifest in someone?
Olympia: Hey, let’s do an Artemis god-touched. I only have Dawn and William at the moment after all.
Ava: Sort of a tie in with Arata’s story as she’s the right hand woman of, like, oh geez, the niece and former fling of the guy who owned him and his mom. I also basically just looked at D&D’s scrying spell, pointed, and went “I want that.”
Eira: What if I did a muse from Katarina’s dad’s side of the family? And what if she was utterly adorable.
Aur: Phew, so, actually, I didn’t have any huge plans for Aur when I first made him! He was an amnesiac and I left his backstory open and vague in case I thought of something later that would be cool to do with him! I figured I could get away with it for a minute since it’s not like he himself knew what his backstory was. In truth, I hadn’t even settled on him being a fae for a while either, I also kept that up in the air! If he didn’t end up a fae then he would’ve been a siren actually I think.
Soon-hee: She’s not really online anymore now but my friend Angie had come up with the idea to do a seven deadly sins thing and asked if I wanted to make a muse or two for it too. And I, contractually obligated by my love for F.MA, couldn’t refuse.
Arya: Ditto, seven sins inspo.
Matthias: Also another Angie-inspired, she came up with a pantheon of deities and asked if I wanted to join in. I thought for a good minute on what domain of power I wanted his to be and I settled on storytelling. Him having muses for sisters was inspired by Greek myth...and H.ercules. His current name came from my white boy of the month every month in a book series called S.ix of C.rows as a sort of homage. And his rings, silver eyes, and some personality beats came from the character Po from the G.raceling book series.
I’m panting..........but part 3, we’re on the way....... 
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arcxnumvitae · 1 month
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Huaxiu generally has a good poker face, however, it's always guaranteed to slip in one specific circumstance. Huaxiu's expression always slips and he always gets an irritated frown on his face whenever a Tengmen noble brings forth their child to suggest the possibility of a marriage between them and the princess.
The emperor's expression always slips into one of pure, unadulterated irritation, and then, without fail, he always tells the parent that he will "take the proposal under consideration." He then simply never responds. Considering his doting attitude, the Tengmen court believes that this bout of protectiveness is due to an expected "no one is good enough for my sister, I'll never let her get married!" sentiment. At this point, the nobles of the court have taken the hint and stopped asking.
In truth, it's because Huaxiu also isn't dumb and remembers Minglian's past treatment by both the parents and their children. He knows that any care the eager noble feign for his sister as they suggest a marriage is done so only out of a desire of the power they could gain having their child married to the princess of the empire. They don't truly care for Minglian's wellbeing. She will have to be married someday, but he'll be damned if he doesn't at least organize a match with a monarch or noble who cares for her and will treat her right.
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arcxnumvitae · 1 month
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Rumors swirl often and constantly in the Tengmen imperial court, about anything and everything. Many joke that the act of spreading new rumors in itself seems to be a hobby among the nobility, to the point where truth and fiction are often blurred.
When the Tengmen emperor was younger, before he took the throne, one rumor swirled among many of a noble that had fallen out of the Emperor's favor, and who was subsequently banished by him in a rage. Did this event truly happen? No one knows the noble's name, nor what they could have done to earn such ire. A million different theories whirled around the palace as to the truth of the matter, as did millions of other theories about the thousands of other rumors that traversed the palace walls. Prince Huaxiu heard of the rumor once or twice, but thought nothing of it. Even if there was some grain of truth to it, his father was a man easily displeased. What was so surprising about him banishing one who earned his ire?
The rumor resurfaced in the wake of the Emperor's death with speculation that this disgraced noble could have been the cause of foul play. The newly-crowned Emperor Huaxiu looked into the matter, but aside from all of the reports suggesting that his father's death came about from natural causes, nothing pointed to the existence of this mystery noble, let alone their head in regicide. So, Emperor Huaxiu let it go.
He forgot about the rumor entirely.
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arcxnumvitae · 1 month
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Fandom Mischaracterizations
@soraeia said: the dragons >:D ❤️
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Jianhuren: Misgendered despite using they/them because of their more "stereotypically" gendered appearances. Only fanart ever drawn is of their masculine form, new people to the fandom are very surprised to learn they have a feminine form at all despite each form getting equal screentime in media. Any trauma and issues related to their histories and actions with their students is ignored in favor of relegating them solely to the wise old mentor archetype. Received some unfortunate characterizations based on Qingshan’s one-sided unrequited crush on them despite them being completely unaware of it and not at all involved.
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Qingshan: Completely ignores any scrap of ace-coding she has. Headcanons her as everything else under the sun BUT ace. Also her muscles are gone. For some reason included as a villain in the same exact ranks of actual innocent-slaughterers and world-enders. "Love can fix her!"
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Huaxiu: Flattens all of his negative traits for the sole purpose of making him a more ideal partner to “save” them/their ocs/other character in said media they ship Huaxiu with/whoever/etc. Gets mad when said negative traits appear in the canon media. Ignores the trauma-based nuance behind Huaxiu’s preference of masculine partners over the years vs feminine and you bet it will not be engaged with at all in fanon. Fandom is likely too busy focusing on whatever ship wars he’s in. “Love can fix him.” Ignores Minglian. Even worse, treats Minglian as an obstacle in the way of any ships despite the fact that she’s not a romantic interest at all and is Just There.
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Meihui: She loves teasing people so that would be kicked up about 20 notches. Always asking Xiaodan for tips and help with her swordplay despite her being older, more experienced, and way more skilled at it than him. Only ever makes an appearance in fan material to prop up Xiaodan's own strength and skills.
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Xiaodan: Because he has a resting face, not even a resting bitch face but just a resting face, his only fanon portrayal is “angery.” Ramps up his fondness of sweets to his only other defining trait. Sex god daddy…somehow, despite having been an uninterested virgin thus far in the series.
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Minglian: There are no fanon interpretations of Minglian because she is treated solely as Huaxiu’s accessory at best and completely ignored at worst. If she got any, then she’s infantilized out the wazoo. Precious baby can’t do a single thing without her teacher, never says a word against him, and does not act any way of her own volition. Needs to be protected from anything and naïve to the point of being a pushover unable to live and function without assistance. Gets called the dreaded M*** S**
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Zhifeng: Woobifies them into only a doe-eyed, sweet being despite them genuinely and explicitly having a foul personality when they're not playing polite. Wife-ification, ignoring said sour traits and softening them into a stereotypically, traditionally feminine, traditionally "wife" role even though it is wildly ooc and then declares that characterization as canon. Zhifeng: *dresses in gnc ways, actively makes it known they're genderfluid, never uses just masculine pronouns, 'I am not a man'* The fandom: What a handsome pretty-boy, I'm going to only call you "he" and constantly use only masculine-gendered terms like boy and man to refer to you, my beautiful little cis male <3. Also sex doll-ifies them despite any and all sexual aspects of their character being explicitly a survival method and not something they engaged with because they genuinely wanted to. Who cares, they're obsessed with sex now!
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arcxnumvitae · 2 months
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Another requested by @soraeia! Huaxiu's difficult with romantic relationships precisely because of past events, it's hard for him to trust in the potential of a relationship if it seems like it's becoming serious. Aside from that, he becomes very sweet in a relationship. Loves spoiling, loves being spoiled, he's full on heart eyes whenever he's looking at his partner and will practically be stuck at their hip if he can help it. Once again, I'm laughing at the sexual parts of the chart because Huaxiu was the hoe of the Red Eyes before Minglian came around! He was living the bachelor life to the fullest! Then Minglian came around and single dad-ified him so he doesn't even feel like sleeping around that much anymore.
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arcxnumvitae · 2 months
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The blog's favorite princess! (This is a S.hadowheart reference). As requested by @soraeia. I went with her main verse for this but nothing of her personality or anything changes, just occupation and race and the like. Cooking/eating together is a love language of its own for Minglian thanks to Huaxiu's influence (in the main verse where he isn't talked down on for his housewife tendencies). I don't know, Huaxiu has simply set a good example for her in how she should be treated!
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arcxnumvitae · 2 months
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Zhaohui doesn't know his own birthday. Through the years and the changing of calendar systems, plus having no reason to and no one to celebrate it with, he's forgotten the date. He figures it's lost to time now.
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Jianhuren remembers it and has made it a point to keep track of when it is. It's November 14.
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arcxnumvitae · 5 months
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Though humans, the royal lines of the Tengmen Empire and Kingdom of Zhongyang claim to their royal birthright is through their supposed descendance from dragons. While most would think this was mere posturing from the original heads in order to set themselves apart from the masses, and some nations further away may indeed think that, it's actually true.
Rumors and gossip run abound in conquered nations about Emperor Huaxiu in battle, fangs bared and skin untouchable by weapons where scales lay. Fugitives from Zhongyang to other kingdoms after the annexation recounted stories of scales gifted to those who held their favor by the former king and queen.
Aside from the rumors, their draconic heritage is nothing that can be summoned by will by the royals, it only seems to present itself during times of extreme emotion or mental disruption.
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arcxnumvitae · 3 months
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shxtteredillusions​ asked:  ©© for all the dragons
Send “©” for a muse fact
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Jianhuren, in actuality, is not very good at asking for help. Since they’re so used to being the eldest of the dragons and the one that others come to for help, they developed a habit of keeping any negativity to themselves. Especially after the ordeal with Qingshan, which actually causes them a great amount of pain and distress.
Jianhuren is not a good cook at all. Not for lack of skill or patience but they tend to space out or get distracted whenever doing so, coupled with the fact that they don’t ever have to cook often to begin with, leads to it being better if they do food prep or cleanup instead. Many a time has something accidentally caught on fire at the oven with Jianhuren right there in the same room
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It was Qingshan who introduced Huaxiu to spicier food, she took him out to eat one day and, deciding to mess with her stuffy little student, decided to order the spiciest dish on the menu for him. Needless to say she was surprised when he loved it. 
She can make simple dishes but is by no means extremely skilled, mainly because she didn’t have any interest in cultivating her culinary skill. Also, she was the one mainly putting out the fires in Jianhuren’s kitchen.
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Despite all of his talk about how he no longer associates himself with the red eyes anymore and is only willing really to bother with Jianhuren at all, Zhaohui still unintentionally finds himself slipping into that “Us/Them” mentality that the other red eyes are prone to. That is, he tends to default to still considering the red eyes like comrades and others as, well, outsiders to their affairs.
Due to the curse placed on him by the gods for his betrayal, his pain tolerance is astronomically high. And once the curse is removed? Not many wounds would faze him or cause him pause at all.
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Huaxiu is by no means a lightweight and can hold his liquor extremely well. One of his favorite pastimes when he was younger was to go to lavish tea houses, listen to the entertainment, order food and wine, and dazzle others with his looks, tolerance, and clearly wealthy disposition. Basically, he was a rich boy who liked indulging himself (maybe it was a byproduct of the years spent training under Qingshan where he lived more simply)
In his library, Huaxiu has countless ancient books and documents that are old enough to be in a museum. Among those, hidden away, are a few certain “books” he obtained when he was younger before he even met Jiao. As time went and he grew older he considered throwing them away, but by that point they were old enough to be considered historical artifacts, and so they remained, although hidden away inside thicker and boring texts so that no one would ever find them. He forgets they’re even there most of the time but would definitely die from embarrassment if anyone ever found them.
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In the few instances she’s encountered him, and of course in the future, Meihui calls Huaxiu “gege” but really she doesn’t have to. They’re extremely close in age by dragon standards, with her being 2,000 and Huaxiu 2,500, so he’s not nearly older enough for her to call him that. It’s just a testament to her teasing personality and her messing a bit with how he tends to act.
Meihui and Xiaodan visit Jianhuren for New Years not only because of their fond feelings for the elder of course, but also because even with Qingshan there before, Jianhuren’s other pupil was always noticeably absent and didn’t often come by to visit. They didn’t want Jianhuren to get lonely.
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Not every dragon in existence was created by the Dragon God like how all of the red eyes were made by him, Meihui for example wasn’t. But Xiaodan was and it was the Dragon God himself who put the seal on his powers during the time he was searching for Jianhuren. Due to this connection, he’s a little bit more familiar with the deity than any “normal” dragons.
He doesn’t look it at all but he actually has a soft spot for kids! He just doesn’t know how to act around them but he finds them very cute. Of note is in the future when Xianzi comes around, anytime Meihui shows up to help train her guess who just so happens to be there with her? Don’t point it out though or he’ll get huffy.
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It may not look it but Vasilios ends up having a hefty influence on Minglian just like Huaxiu. Namely, from him teaching her and showing her how he builds things started a love for creation for her. Afterwards, Minglian will find herself interested in drawing, painting, and playing instruments and shows a talent in all of it too. 
Her favorite flower is the lotus. Not because of her name (Lian 莲 means lotus) but because she became enamored with the lotus flowers that grew in the lake at Huaxiu’s estate.
Bonus third: While at first Huaxiu just handled both of their laundry, eventually after their emotions being returned Minglian asked to be in charge of her own stuff. Huaxiu was a bit confused but agreed, not realizing that it was because the embarrassment and realization hit her all of a sudden that he was handling all of her clothes, underthings included. Huaxiu doesn’t know the reason but if he did he still wouldn’t get it because he was the one who picked out and bought them in the first place, and thus has already seen them.
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