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curiosity-killed · 3 years

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Hi....If you don't mind me asking, who are your favorite MXTX characters (top 5 from each novel)? And why? I'm sorry if you've answered this question before.

Aw of course I don’t mind! Though I feel like my answer is going to be a disaster bc I love these casts so so much aha let’s see:

✨ SPOILERS AHEAD ✨

MDZS/CQL

1. Wei Wuxian

Ah so I feel like this is obvious based on the sheer quantity of things I produce and the effort I put into hurting him 😅 but yeah! I love how much of a classical tragic hero he is and I love how much love he has and how that gets twisted around and shaped into a collar of spikes around his own neck. I saw gif sets of wwx before I ever knew about CQL and my reaction was “fuck. I’m going to love him” and I do! And I love that he does learn from his past and I love most of all that he learns to accept the love he is given and is able to make a happy ending in a place of being loved and held in respect and appreciation

2. Wen Qing

On the other hand, I did not expect to be like “mine now” with Wen Qing. Don’t get me wrong, the sexy immortal look got me but it wasn’t really till I started writing fic that I was like ohhhhh Oh Boy. Wen Qing is brilliant and ruthless, fiercely loving and aloof and cold. I love that she gets the lose-lose challenge of balancing what is right for her family vs what is right in the world, what she owes to her sect and what she owes to individuals. The golden core transfer is my favorite dubious science experiment in p much all media I’ve consumed. She gets to be so human—prickly and tough and also achingly gentle and afraid and putting on a tough face and sometimes still crying. “I’m sorry and thank you” ! Im!!

3. Jiang Yanli

The first fic I wrote for this fandom was literally “Jiang Yanli died no she didn’t” lmao I do feel like I underserve Jiang Yanli in that I often fall prey to using her to further the complexity that the male characters are permitted while denying her the chance to be given the same space for development and breath — something to work on! But in that, I really genuinely love how tightly she binds herself to her family and how she tries so hard to be what others need her to be—and then she does make a choice for herself and for a single moment at least, she gets to be loved and to be happy and to have this, a husband and a son and a place, for herself. And terribly I love how much she permeates the story still after death. She is the unspoken voice, the face turned from the camera but always still present, carried in the hearts and names and memories of the ones left behind

She deserved better but—I am weak for the tragedy of it all

4. Jiang Cheng

Another surprise (tho hardly surprising in hindsight): Jiang Cheng is just...horribly understandable. He makes terrible choices and his greatest heroism is undone by a choice made for him or, in the case of “killing the Yiling Laozu” is a lie. He is such a youngest sibling who doesn’t want to be the youngest until all at once, he’s the one in charge and he doesn’t want it at all. He is full of anger and hurt and so much love he doesn’t know what to do with it, doesn’t want it anymore, has no place to put all of its terrible, overwhelming flood.

5. Lan Wangji

I almost didn’t put Lan Wangji or Jiang Cheng on here and then I realized that this is sort of a list of characters I’m pickiest about in fic and...yeah. I think what I love best about Lan Wangji is his journey of grief and healing and through that, his decision to step into world. Where Wei Wuxian’s decision to travel and be removed from the cultivation world (in varying degrees depending on your headcanon preference lol) is really, really important to me, Lan Wangji’s decision to go from being an isolated lone agent working apart from the systems of the world to being involved and invested in changing those systems and working to make them better is also really important to me. I’ve talked before about how relatable Lan Wangji is to me (esp with regards to our interaction with the outer world) and there is something deeply hopeful and comforting about post-timeskip Lan Wangji being in his like mid-/late-30s and still making decisions and growing and changing and choosing to invest himself in the world and the future

yeah. i have thoughts here that I don’t really have the maturity, life experience, or articulation to put into words but Lan Zhan Good basically

TGCF

1. Xie Lian

suuuurpriiiiise!! Yeah honestly mxtx’s mains in TGCF and MDZS really just hit all my buttons basically. What appeals to me most of all about Xie Lian is, fittingly, how he is humanity taken to extremes. His capacity for incredible kindness and compassion is equaled with his capacity for cruelness and ruthlessness. His heaven-shaking highs are matched with calamitous lows. He is the hyperbolic of what it is to be human—and he is also the small moments, the wildflowers and the maple leaves and the mundane chores and the comfort of whispered conversations late into the night. I could quite literally go on for pages about what I love about Xie Lian but I am not Hua Cheng and can restrain myself LMAO

2. Hua Cheng

of all the characters on these lists, Hua Cheng is the one I’m pickiest about tbh! When I say I love him for similar reasons as Xie Lian I don’t actually mean this as being similarities between the two but the fact that both of them so richly convey mxtx’s points about the nature of humanity and what it is to be human. Hua Cheng is both the boldest and most arrogant of all and also the most vulnerable, the one who shies away from the truth because he’s braced for it to hurt and isn’t sure he can take it. He is gory blood rain and an umbrella to shelter a fragile bloom; he is a blade whose wounds only heal if he permits it and he is a sacrifice that he brushes aside as a fit of madness. *pats his head* this boy can fit SO MUCH inside him that he refuses to acknowledge

3. Jun Wu

Definitely my favorite antagonist in recent reading. I was doubtful of him from the start (something something issues with authority something something probably should talk to my theoretical future therapist shhh) but the unfolding of his reveal was so delightfully painful and exquisite that I was like “YES!!!” reading all of it. About the epitome of a satisfying plot twist imo. But about the character himself, I love how he parallels so many — Xie Lian in his rise and fall, his glory and disgrace; Hua Cheng in his fixation and ruthlessness; He Xuan in losing himself to the plot and not knowing how to move forward. I love that he feels beyond human in a way the others don’t—he’s so old and has gone through so much and he doesn’t feel things the way humans do anymore, doesn’t remember right how love squeezes the heart or how hate can exist without acting on it. I love that he thinks he knows how to control everyone and that it’s such mundane things that fool him: Xie Lian’s absurd stubbornness, Hua Cheng’s foolish faith, Yin Yu’s...emotional maturity??? Not Sure how to verbalize that one. But in the end, he is defeated by both the humanity of others and by his own—he’s so tired. He’s exhausted in a way that gods and ghosts aren’t meant to be. He is, under the armor and the masks, the curses and the power, human—benevolent and cruel, evil and good.

4. He Xuan

I love my fish man! No but really I love how He Xuan is so fixed on his one goal that he refuses to acknowledge anything else in his (after)life—which doesn’t make it go away. I love that he is left unmoored, purposeless through the very act of completing that which gives him purpose. I love his long con and the ways he clings to himself but loses himself not in the act but in the telling himself it’s an act. I love that he tries to be a moral man and then becomes a ghost king, a calamity. His reveal is also terribly badass and I do love his bone fish wholly unironically. Like I’m not going to get a He Xuan tattoo (for one thing I’ve been meaning to get a tattoo for 5 years and still haven’t gotten around to it) but also. B o n e f i s h

5. Mu Qing

Of course! The Jiang Cheng of tgcf lol Mu Qing (which my phone desperately wants to autocorrect to my Qing) is so...gah he’s such a mess! And he so fully commits to the belief that no one will ever see and understand him as he is but will always view them through their own convictions about him and his actions — which is simultaneously heartbreakingly lonely and also. Sir You Are a Clown. I genuinely think he’s owed apologies from both Feng Xin and Xie Lian for their treatment and assumptions of him and think that he would be HORRIBLY offended at the thought (while secretly touched? But like secretly even to himself). He will never explain himself and will just clam up tighter the more people accuse him and it’s such a self-sabotaging behavior and also so horribly relatable. I love u sir, you’re a disaster

SVSS I have not read but I do really like the moshang art 😂

#long post #asked & answered #lol sorry this is so long and incoherent #the truth is that I really love these stories and their casts #and I think it’s v hard to extricate the characters from the cast #because they are so deftly and beautifully interwoven #but here are the characters I think are my favorites lol #loosely in order #tgcf spoilers #also this is why I prefer tgcf to mdzs tbh?#jgy is intellectually interesting to me and a good antagonist #but not personally compelling in the way jw is

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nerdwaifuu · 5 years

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Chapter 2 of my Ninjago Dystopia story.

« Hello old friend, You probably have no clue who I am because of loss of memory. You can thank The Council for that. Speaking of The Council, I can say their ways are utter bullshit."

Dareth immediately slammed the journal shut as he wished he never laid eyes on the page. He wished he never opened the book. He wished he never even saw the book. He wished that whoever left it in his bar didn't. Yet, he couldn't identify the feeling, but there was something in his mind telling him to continue. There was a desire to finish reading the message, and he had already read part of it so what point was there to not continue.

Opening the journal again, Dareth read,

« Despite all I have done in my life, you can trust me, and I hope I can trust you. Wherever and whenever I decide to give this to you, I hope you do use this journal. Express the feelings and thoughts you have to repress everyday in order to survive... or don't. You can just turn it in and they can just try to find out whoever wrote this. Good luck to them since nobody writes with a pen and paper anymore. Do not bother to ask who I am, how I know you, and if this is a trick. This is not a trick or a trap. I will not share any information written in this journal to anyone. I'm not even supposed to be able to have this journal in my possession, but I'm willing to take any risks to get in connection with someone who knew the ninja. So, I hope you do use this journal. If you do write anything in it, leave it in the place you found it and I'll pick it up, or somewhere near that area if I'm an idiot and leave it where people will see it. I'll find it. »

The message ended there. No signature; no goodbye; nothing indicating the end other than there being nothing after the last sentence. Closing the journal, Dareth covered his face and silently screamed into his hands. Never in a million years did he think someone else within the area had some suspicion of The Council and how everything was now. Now, he had a chance to talk to whoever this was. He now could see in words everything that was wrong, written neatly by someone he once knew. The identity of that person concerned Dareth slightly more than the content of his or her message. It easily could be anyone; it could be one of the ninja, despite the belief of their death at the beginning of the fall of Ninjago, or it could just be a random person he has no memory of. If there was a chance the ninja were alive and in the city, Dareth found it quite odd that they wrote "someone who knew the ninja," instead of "someone who knew us," but it would make sense if they were hiding their identity. Either way, no matter who left it for him, the journal was here in his hands, waiting for the pen to touch the page and for him to start writing. Taking the pen in his right hand, Dareth could feel his hand shake as it approached the paper. It has been years and years since he had to write; everything had been switched to technology created by The Council's team of scientists, which includes the great Cyrus Borg as the leading name of the group. Those in the city only needed to know how to type, where there's autocorrect, shortcuts, and grammar check. Writing was outdated and something not endorsed in society by The Council.

With a sigh, Dareth sat there with the tip of pen only a millimeter away from the page. Not one idea was ready to come out of hiding and go onto the page; as soon as one did, Dareth knew Death would be waiting at his doorstep. Looking at the side of the screen, which acted like a television, he could hear the music that is played all day decreased in volume as a voice spoke over the music. It was time for the news for today. Closing the journal, Dareth stood up and strolled over to the window. Outside, boats slowly passed by in the dirty, polluted waters down below. He couldn't remember how it looked before. Were the colors of the boats brighter? Was the boats more stable and didn't look like they went through 5 hurricanes? Was the water clear and beautiful to look at? Now, there was no way to know.

Looking back at the screen, a young woman stood there quickly going through several news stories.

« Food rations had been raised to 20%. »

Rations had really dropped from 30% to 20%.

« Unemployment has dropped from 20% to 15%. The lowest it has been the past few years. »

Unemployment had really increased to 20%.

Dareth was ready to zone out to think about what to write in the journal. The woman was only spewing lies that she was forced to announce. Besides, the news of not much of an interest to Dareth anymore. He felt like there was something, or someone, missing that made him watch the news. He couldn't figure out what it was, but it didn't matter at a time like this. All that mattered was the journal, and what the woman was about to say.

« Stixx has been conquered by The Council, who plan to rebuild the once large city and rid the criminals who roam the salvage yard. Now, a person believes he witnessed one of the ninja today...»

Dareth's heard perked at the mention of the ninja. All attention was on the screen now, but he tried to hide his interest from whoever was on the other side of the screen, watching his every move.

« However, this is not the case. The person who looked like one the ninja was just a random citizen who had worn something similar to the attire of the ninja, who has been taken care of. The Council would like to remind you that the Ninja are traitors. They have been given their rightful punishments and have been removed from society... »

Dead. The ninja were dead. For all five years of the Civil War, the ninja had been gone. Everybody knew; some denied the fact and want to believe they escaped and are in hiding. Unfortunately, Dareth believed that was not the case. There could be a chance since so much information given out in Ninjago was lies, but it was unlikely. The Council had a grave for everyone; one wrong move, and you were stuck in that grave forever; there was no escaping. The only ninja who technically escaped their grave was the white ninja, who has been reprogrammed to forget the truth.

Of course, The Council wished they could reprogram everyone to forget that the Ninja never existed like they did with the white ninja. The best they could do was erase their names, but their existence was still known across all of Ninjago. Evidence of their existence always appeared, so The Council usually used the group as a group example of what happens to traitors; what happens to people who go against The Council and follow the ideals of the villagers. The thought of what could happen to him sent a chill down Dareth’s spine. He’ll surely experience it soon enough as soon as he writes one word in the journal, but the person on the other line is already risking it all by giving the journal to him; Dareth was certain he should just take all the risks now.

Walking back to the corner of room, Dareth sat back down and opened the journal, immediately writing. He got through his shaky hand, his messy handwriting, and constant scribbling; he just needed to write what he thought.

Of course, Dareth asked how the hell the person got into his bar, but he didn’t care about that now. He had other things on his mind.

« Do you think the ninja are still alive... other than the white ninja? All hope of them being alive after whatever The Council did to them is gone. What I find weird is how much we still remember about them. Sure, we don’t remember their names, but we remember much more. Their elements, their ninja suits, their battles, their existence. The Council may remove everything else about our past, but they can’t remove the ninja. They still live on in our hearts and minds, whether they are dead or living among us or the villagers. »

There were so many mistakes scribbled out and every word written was messy, yet the message was still readable. Before he shut the journal for the night, Dareth quickly added a couple more sentences to end off his message, so he can leave this in his bar for whoever he is writing for.

« Plus, aren’t we sorta crazy for doing this. Aren’t you scared that you’ll get caught? Don’t you want to continue living? »

#ninjago #ninjago fanfic #ninjago fanfiction #ninjago dystopia au #ninjago dareth

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