#tagging both of them but it's really just xue yang

[greenandhazy]

okay this is random but I find it really funny how neatly my favorite MDZS/CQL ships fit into a very distinct pattern and I got curious about, like, broader fandom opinions.

So. there are TWO instances in canon where you have a trio of people--Person A is widely considered to be very kind and just, and basically his main/only flaw is trusting the wrong people. Person B is his longterm friend, who is a little grumpier/angrier/slightly more judgmental, but also fundamentally good, and equal to him in power (and fairly close in height). Person C is a Villain with a traumatic childhood past marked by rejection and physical injuries, associated with the Wen and later the Jin. He is devoted to(/obsessed with) Person A more so than anyone else in his personal storyline, and he murders Person B via tricky means and conceals that fact from Person A. (And then, depending on the 'verse, C is also then murdered by B's fierce corpse.)

I filtered for the relationships on AO3 and got some fun results. In both cases, the most popular two-person ship from these trios are A/C, followed by A/B, and only then by B/C--although, interestingly, A/B/C is the least popular combination when it comes to 3zun, whereas SongXueXiao is in third place, being more popular than SongXue.

Statistics!! as of 5/26/2023

Lan Xichen/Nie Mingjue/Meng Yao:

there are 4,115 fics tagged for Lan Xichen/Meng Yao

if you exclude 3zun as an additional ship tag, that drops to 3,808

92.5% of XiYao fics lack the 3zun tag (which makes it the most "independent" of any of the ships mentioned in this post)

there are 1,969 fics tagged for Lan Xichen/Nie Mingjue

if you exclude 3zun, that drops to 1,718

87% of NieLan fics lack the 3zun tag

there are 1,581 fics tagged for Nie Mingjue/Meng Yao

if you exclude 3zun, that drops to 1,286

81% of NieYao fics lack the 3zun tag

in total, there are 1,002 fics tagged for 3zun, compared to 6,812 fics that feature some combination of the three but not all of them, a 6.8 to 1 ratio. (although I didn't filter for fics that featured all three 2-person ship tags without also featuring the 3-person ship tag because... idk, seemed like a pain.)

Xiao Xingchen/Song Lan/Xue Yang:

there are 2,817 fics tagged for Xiao Xingchen/Xue Yang

if you exclude SXX, that drops to 2,367

84% of XueXiao fics lack the SXX tag

there are 2,328 fics tagged for Xiao Xingchen/Song Lan

if you exclude SXX, that drops to 1,897

81% of SongXiao fics lack the SXX tag

there are 744 fics tagged for Song Lan/Xue Yang

if you exclude SXX, that drops to 313

42% of SongXue fics lack the SXX tag (which makes it the least "independent" of any of these ships by a LOT. XiYao is only 8% ahead of the next most-independent ship, while SongXue is 39% behind the next most-dependent ships.)

in total, there are 1,015 fics tagged for SXX, compared to 4,577 fics that feature various combinations between them, a 4.5 to 1 ratio.

I think it's really interesting looking at the ways these break down similarly and differently! like, for 3zun, there is a VERY big gap between the most popular pairing and the second most popular one, with 2nd and 3rd place being very close, whereas for SongXueXiao, there is a muuuuch narrower margin between between the two most popular ships, and then the greatest gap is between the second-most-popular duo and the least popular duo.

I also think it's noteworthy that I've been in fandom for half my life and have never managed to have the strongest feelings about the most popular ships for my favorite characters lol, but there's no fun statistics for that.

#3zun #songxuexiao #xiyao #nieyao #nielan #songxue #xuexiao #songxiao #the untamed

[spockandawe]

So! Binderary! I don't recall how much I said on here, but I sent out a couple packages to a couple authors after that all wrapped up. Some fun trivia about me is that I am shy to a hilariously useless degree, and by the end of all these packages, I was too embarrassed(???) to double check if old addresses were still good. And in one case, it wasn't! I remade the books, naturally, because that's completely my mistake and also the typesetting was done, and with books quarto and smaller, material costs go way down. And now this package is safely delivered to the correct hands, and I can share!

These are the books where I hadn't posted photos of then originals yet, because titling spoilers, and the design choices are a pure repeat, so I'm not going to be redundant about things. Just imagine these books x2 in my records, and you'll have it right! We've got a fun smattering of mdzs fics here, first two remakes of Ameliarating's work that I did WAY back when, but I'm much better at small books now, so I had to give them the luxury treatment!

Check out Restoration for some yi city reincarnation fun, and lover to your nightmare for some sexy xuexiao delirious sickfic! That one has always appealed to me from a design perspective, really capturing that delirium tag in the binding of the story. These two books were what SOLD me on the use of low contrast titling choices this year, which was a whole lot of fun. And then in addition, I also bound A Wiser Fool, which is more xuexiao, but in a setting Xue Yang is blind and Xiao Xingchen is not. I don't remember if the tags there are first place I read the phrase 'xue yang's feather-light conscience', but it's sure stuck with me ever since! And I am so pleased with that pairing of the quiet purples and pinks in the cover fabric, foil, and endpapers.

After that, we've got some veliseraptor fic that I had never tackled before. I say this is a collection of mdzs fics, but really, the most specific throughline here is Xue Yang 😂 First of all, on a narrow road, which is 34k of fabulous songxuexiao amnesia road trip romance. I've had this cover fabric for years without knowing where to use it, but it just felt right here, especially with subdued titling on top. And then we have this world is gonna break your heart, which is Xue Yang/Jiang Yanli, and look I swear just give it a look, it's so compelling and works SO well! I bound that in faux suede (my beloved) and titled it with black foil for a nice lush effect, and it's hard to see with the reflections, but that t character in the title has branching roots extending underneath it, which felt like such a fun touch for a story about demonicn cultivation. And for both these books, I was able to break into a stash of chiyogami paper I bought to experiment with, bringing in some flowers and metallics for a nice bit of maximalist polish that I thought played well with the covers without overwhelming them. Less is more is never a philosophy that clicked with me, haha

#crafts #bookbinding #binderary #technically

[deathbyoctopi]

The year is finished, so it is time to look back and go through the best AO3 treasures I found these last 12 months!! And since XueXiao has been the bane of my existence ever since i discovered it, I decided to make a top 10 list of them! 

So these are (in no particular order) my favourite (song)xuexiao fics:

- the backyard is full of bones by @veliseraptor  A thoroughly enjoyable what-if with Xiao Xingchen being a bit smarter about the wounded man he found. Extremely well paced and written, it eases into the enemies-to-lovers dynamic perfectly, and it depicts characters so believable and well-rounded that it practically feels like canon. 

- I promised you a garden by @lady-of-the-lotus  A short snippet into an alternate timeline where Song Lan’s consciousness is trapped in a paperman and forced to bear witness to the yizhuang’s (very sexy) domestic life. Cute and frustrating and very, very satisfying. (One of those where Song Lan’s not having a good time, which might be one of my favourite tags). 

- Now that I see you by @10holmes​  Don’t usually go with unfinished projects, but this one is an absolute treasure which’d need to work very hard to go awry, so of course I’ll have it here. We have a double canon divergence with Not Blind!Xiao Xingchen, and Amnesiac!Xue Yang!! Which make for a delightfully angsty relationship as they both tiptoe around each other, all while battling with internal turmoil, conflicting morals and a misplaced low sense of worth. A fic absolutely worth keeping track of. 

- The prisoner of Jinlintai by @fieri-sentio-et-excrucior  A rather recent project that had us in tethers for a month and a half (!) with the very sexy prompt of Xiao Xingchen being framed and arrested by the Jin, while a certain guest disciple with a sweet tooth was still around... Another enemies-to-lovers with a wonderfully natural evolution in their relationship, with the extra treat of a rich and entertaining world building that could easily sprout a few spin-offs. 

- Nothing but a way of shading blood by @veilchenjaeger​  This one is very recent, but it shoot up to my top 10 immediately, both for the marvelous writing style and the perfect way they executed the prompt. It provides just the right amount of anguish in Xiao Xingchen, before and after certain discoveries are made, and the diplomacy game with Jin Guangyao and his minion just adds an extra flavour in an already spicy mix. 

- Heaven has a road but no one walks it by @silvysartfulness​  The second (and last) ongoing project here, but just as deserving of the spot. This book-sized treasure is a long journey of (re)discovery, of a slowly kindling relationship with wonderful twists and turns. The slow pace balances out perfectly with some intense (and, in one occasion, thriller-like) action scenes. Also, it was the fic that made me see SongXueXiao with a more favourable opinion.  

- lie back and let me unlock you by @veliseraptor  A short and extremely sexy xuexiao roll in the hay, with the amazing prompt of Xiao Xingchen being (quite shamefully) aroused at the thought of his old enemy Xue Yang, and good ol’ Chengmei offering to rolplay. The result is even more unbelievable that what you can imagine! 

- On the topic of cold by @andreri25  A cute little snippet in the early days at Yi City, where Xiao Xingchen almost dies from hypothermia and Xue Yang has to keep him warm. So what if he takes advantatge? Daozhang won’t remember, and he does need some hot friction after all! It’s wicked and cute in equal parts, because Xue Yang starts off really concerned (even if he wouldn’t admit it or know why, really) but changes gears when the danger is over...

- Final victory by @fieri-sentio-et-excrucior​  A funny concept very well executed, particularly in the emotional response both Xiao Xingchen and Xue Yang give at the different turns of the plot. Daozhang discovers that his old enemy is in town, killing people, and after recovering from the surprise, Chengmei offers his help to hunt him down. Cue some well-placed deceit and a cruelly cute happy ending. 

- it hurts at first (but it ain’t that bad) by @veliseraptor  Yet another change in dynamics with Xiao Xingchen discovering his mysterious friend’s identity, if only this time because Xue Yang flat-out tells him (well, he thought he was done for anyways). What follows is a wonderful deluge of arguments, moral dilemmas and Xue Yang’s particular brand of twisted social logic that allow a deeper (and less deadly) reprise of their last canon conversation. Just lovely. 

Which one of those I like best? I don’t know. I don’t care! They are all fantastic. 

AND, since this year was also the first I started actually writing some original content, and not only devouring other artists amazing works, lemme put them here as well >w<

- Phantom Threat  The foregone conclusion of all the fix-its that have xuexiao become an item (sans hidden identities, that is), in which Song Lan arrives at Yi City and does what he should have done in canon and talks directly with Xiao Xingchen, to reveal the terrible secret... which he already knows about. 

- To carry a bit of yesterday  A small slice of life in the Three Year Bliss, where Xiao Xingchen wants a family portrait and despite being quite contrary to the idea, both a-Qing and Xue Yang end up complying. It has amazing art by @wrathyforest​, too!! ^-^

AND FINALLY, just a few non-xuexiao fics I also loved to the moon and back, but have little-to-no connection other than belonging to the mxtx universe. 

- You’re stuck with me by LikeAFlamingKiss_Consume  A delightful jadecest with dark!Lan Xichen (well, dark!Everyone and their mother, it’s a fucked up AU) and a reluctantly horny Lan Zhan. 

- Blood array by @giraffeter​  Though it could technically be a xuexiao fic, the actual fucking here is between Demonic Gremlin Team Extraordinaire! Xue Yang and Wei Wuxian, sooo... doesn’t count. The fic is entertaining, very sexy and their interaction is marvelous to follow! 

- Despite warning signs by @extrapenguin​  A surprisingly cute and light-hearted Xue Yang/Mo Xuanyu little treat, from their days as Jin disciples. A happier alternative reality for both of them, with fluff and smut in equal parts, which never fails to make me smile. 

- Qi Rong’s day off by @ahintofblue​  Too bad the only tgcf fic to make the cut is a very, very nsfw alternate outcome of the mausoleum scene from book 2, but what can I do? The writing’s so smooth and engaging, it’s rough and cruel and I loved every single minute of it. 

I have the gnawing feeling I’m still forgetting something, either here or in the xuexiao part... but until I discover the way to check which fics I left kudos in, I either go through an ocean of titles from my ao3 history page (that won’t even let me filter!!!) or I just wait for my two braincells to click one day. Oh, well!

Thanks for reading, and to all writers, THANKS FOR WRITING!!! I love you all. Have a happy new year!

#the untamed #mo dao zu shi #mdzs #cql #ao3 #xuexiao #thank gods for ao3 and every single one of its writers #mdzs fics #fanfic review #the most PRECIOUS THINGS I've read this year #octopi reviews #tgcf #heavenly official's blessing #tian guan ci fu #(yes. the last one ^^U) #mdzs recs #fanfic recs #rec list

[mdzs-fanon-exposed]

An in-text rumor rating does sound interesting!

For example, WWX being a ‘playboy’ is something believed by everyone, even JC, and fandom even has a tag for it. But!there are lines about WWX saving his first kiss, he never follows up on his flirts, he actually dies a virgin himself, and a lot of those rumors came from ‘yllz deflowering virgins’ and other propaganda to turn WWX into a public target by the clans. And at the time WWX was stuck on a corpse mountain burying a giggling radish.

So the RUMOR is true but it’s not ‘true’ for the character.

And, JC killing DC cultivators as a ‘rumour’ is interesting. Cuz one of the first thoughts we get from JC is him thinking to take away ‘MXY’ to ‘confirm’ and this is from his first opening appearance. When JC feels sure and WWX is finally cornered, JC just gives a gesture and his disciples act immediately, bribing and cordoning off the inn and absolutely no one intervenes as WWX screams in terror from inside.

Jin Ling is the most important character witness for JC, as he the closest to him and also the one who defends JC the most. And he confirms that JC ‘doesn’t let any of them go even if they’re innocent’ and actively helps MXY escape, saving him from his own Uncle. Even if the specific statement about JC whipping people to death is false, there is enough to say that there is some credibility to it overall. And JC’s overall violent behavior, even to his own nephew, doesn’t do him any favors.

This is getting a bit too long sorry, but I need to point out a problem with mo dao and gui dao. Just in case you don’t know, the official translation messes up these extremely important words which leads to a lot of confusion about WWX’s actual cultivation and fanon claiming that it is evil. WWX practices gui dao and other than one time, uses this to describe his cultivation. Xue Yang uses mo dao and all its horrors as seen in Yi City and the Villainous Friends extra.

This can get very confusing when getting into details and singular incidents, when seeing how the narrative treats WWX’s cultivation, how the public is made to see it, how clans like LQR assume it to be, how JGS tries to recreate it, and of course, how it’s treated when compared to the Nie cultivation and how its users always canonically Qi deviate but doesn’t face such scrutiny cuz Nie is a Great Clan.

But obviously you can’t just believe my words, so perhaps there might be a need for a direct Chinese text confirmation, maybe from a trusted friend or online if you can find a trusted source (very hard in this fandom sadly).

Thank you for your time. I hope this blog is fun for you, I love MDZS and having even more people analyzing this amazing book and text is wonderful.

i really appreciate your second ask, and there's no need to apologize! i did in fact ask for correction on that claim about jiang cheng, and i'm happy to get constructive feedback. thank you for messaging me! (and if these aren't sent from the same person...... whoops)

to your second point: if i'm understanding it correctly, you're saying that the "demonic cultivation" we know from the english translations is actually two things mistranslated as one; wei wuxian's branch "gui dao", which he invented, and the actual "mo dao" of Mo Dao Zu Shi, which is the more... harmful/evil of the two, and which maybe existed before wei wuxian came along? (or he invented both but only uses gui dao?) the implications i'm getting here are that the fandom (and many of the characters) misconstrues wei wuxian's actual method for the "evil" method and so thinks wei wuxian is committing more harm than he actually is.

that's a really interesting point, and i'm glad you brought it to my attention. unfortunately, i don't have any preexisting trusted friends/sources that would be able to help me with the chinese raws. in general, my unfamiliarity with these nuances (and chinese culture as a whole) means that i'm much more likely to make mistakes if i rely on that knowledge base on this blog. as i mentioned in my pinned post, i'm only using the english translation of the novels for this reason, and the english versions don't differentiate between different forms of demonic cultivation.

in future posts i will likely not be making a distinction between "gui dao" and "mo dao" without extra help; however, i also don't intend on answering any submissions that would require me to make the distinction anyways. i'm trying to be as objective as possible on this blog (with the exception of some clearly labeled analysis), and i don't exactly feel qualified to rate something as subjective as morality. i can rate the canon or fanon status of specific actions such as "wei wuxian digs up graves," but submissions that make generalizing statements along the lines of "wei wuxian's branch of cultivation is evil" will be ignored.

thank you again for the ask! i'd love to continue this conversation, especially if you (or anyone else) wants to clarify something here. i love MDZS too and i'm really happy that so many people are coming along for this ride with me :)

#asks and answers

[silvysartfulness]

1, 2, 12, 16 and 22 for the ask game! No particular fandom, up to you.

the character everyone gets wrong

Gonna say a toss-up between Xiao Xingchen and Xue Yang here.Guess it depends on whether you mean in fic or just in The Discourse in general?

I see so so many bad takes on Xue Yang, especially people utterly glossing over his trauma, and... I'm happy for you guys, I guess, who've apparently never known trauma and what it does to a person? It's not a matter of Xue Yang deciding to be a murderous asshole because he broke a finger once. It's that his entire personality and the way his mind works were brutally shaped by severe abuse and trauma at a very young age. You don't have to like him or at all condone his actions, but have a little compassion, for fuck's sake.

As for Xiao Xingchen... I don't know which rubs me the wrong way the most, the "lol XXC can't do math" crowd claiming he's outright stupid, or the "lol XXC was raised by hippies" who utterly disregard his whole cultural context. Personally not at all a fan of mean (dom) Xiao Xingchen either, I just can't see it work with his canon personality, but to each their own, I guess. I won't read it, though.

2. a compelling argument for why your fave would never top or bottom

Hmmm. That's actually a tough one, because I hc Xue Yang (And Xiao Xingchen for that matter) as rather fluid switches without particular preference as long as things are sexy and feel good.

I guess you could argue that Xue Yang would be wary about who he'd let top him because of his rough and precarious childhood and how badly the world's hurt him, but then, the boy also has a self-destructive high-risk-behaviour streak a mile wide, so.

I guess the closest I can get is that I don't think Song Lan enjoys the idea of bottoming, partly because of his more ingrained ideas of masculinity and femininity and the power roles he feels are inherent in topping/bottoming, but more importantly because he already struggles with physical touch, and the idea of being held down, touched and "trapped" in any way during sex is a bit scary. Not to say he wouldn't come around to it, but it'd take a lot more mulling over - and gentle experimentation. 😏

I already answered 12, so moving on to 16. you can't understand why so many people like this thing (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc)

Oh man, is this my cue to mutter about mean dom Xiao Xingchen again? Like, I get the appeal of exploring characters far outside their canon constraints, I really do, and if mean dom Xiao Xingchen tickles your metaphorical pickle, by all means, have fun! I just personal really dislike it. (I am super grateful to all writers out there who have started tagging for it, though! It makes it easier to avoid - and find, for those who are into it. Everyone wins!)

As for pairings, I just don't like SangCheng or XiCheng, they both feel very pair-the-spares to me, and are just... Mm. Not for me. Honestly, funnily enough, SongXiao goes here, too, 95% of the time. I pretty much only like these two as part of SXX - I don't know if it is because of many SongXiao shippers' way of treating Xue Yang like dirt, or just because the two characters on their own don't interest me much, but yeah. On the whole, I won't read fic for just SongXiao unless recommended by people I trust, and I'll only like/reblog art if it's very pretty and doesn't imply dead Xue Yang.

I also really don't like most modern au BDSM fic? So much of it reads like a wholesome manual - and I'm sure for people in that scene, it's really hot! It just doesn't do anything at all for me, except give me secondhand embarrassment. If sex is going to be a bit painful and having undertones of dominance and submission, i want it to be very, very real, borderline dangerous and not done for play or politely negotiated beforehand. Gimme the hot mess or nothing.

(Mandatory disclaimer that these are just my personal squicks and mehs, not passing any judgment on anyone who does like them! My Kink Is Not Your Kink And That's Okay, and ship and let ship. ✌)

I already answered 22, too, but... Hm. I'm sure I can think of more if I try...

22. your favorite part of canon that everyone else ignores

I think Xue Yang's and a-Qing's relationship is a lot more complicated than a lot of people seem to want to think! Especially for those who've only watched CQL, where a lot of the Yi City arc was either cut or angled to make it into more of a psychological thriller - but they were a family! All three of them, and in the text there is such clear evidence that they all really cared about each other! Even Xue Yang.

A-Qing stole his candy without fear, asked him "why were you like that when you were little??" when he told the first half of the story of his childhood trauma. When she claimed to have been bullied to the point of crying, he protectively told her how to defend herself and made her apple bunnies to cheer her up. Even after Xiao Xingchen's death (and he must have known by then that she was the one who sold him out) one of the things he did while cleaning the house was to make her bed, waiting for her to come back home.

Not least of all, Wang Haoxuan said in his in-character farewell note that Xue Yang would have protected a-Qing as long as their happy 'dream' in Yi City lasted.

They ended horribly, yes, causing each others' deaths, but there was a time where they cared deeply about each other and looked out for each other, and that still matters.

#violence ask game #asksilvy #untamed artfulness #thank you for asking! #♥

[lansplaining]

I don’t think any character gets told by fandom to just... not want what they want the way that JGY does. Even Xue Yang! I never see anybody being like “well he just needed to get over the whole Xiao Xingchen thing,” because we recognise that someone capable of doing that, or willing to do that, would be a different character. 

Obviously people complain Jiang Cheng should have chosen WWX over his sect/his fear of retaliation from other clans, or that both Lans should have defied their sect at various points, but for those characters, that conflict actually happens for them, too. Jiang Cheng does want to choose WWX, but in the end, he can’t. Lan Wangji does want to defy the Lan/society to protect Wei Wuxian and eventually does, and Lan Xichen does a version of the same thing the leniency of Wangji’s punishment. 

But you don’t see people criticising desires that the characters themselves never question, and that are fundamental to who they are, the way people do with JGY. Nobody’s like “Wei Wuxian should have said fuck the Jiang, I don’t owe them shit and left Jiang Cheng to die or be coreless.” Or “Nie Mingjue should have left well enough alone and let JGY live his life.” Xue Yang’s really the best example to me, because he’s also a ‘villain’ in a manner of speaking, and nobody’s like “Xue Yang should have just not wanted revenge :(”. And yet, people are like “well JGY should have just not wanted his dad to love him” or “he should have just not wanted to enter cultivation society.” 

And at that point-- as @labyrynth said in their tags earlier today-- he’s just... a completely different character. 

(The answer: something something murder is sexy, something something striving for self-advancement is not.) 

#some JGY fans do say that about NMJ lol #but u know what i mean #and i do think XY should have chilled the fuck out but like #never as an actual critique of the character?

[vallssafanoria]

2022 Fic Rec Time!!!

The year is finished, so it is time to look back and go through the best AO3 treasures I found these last 12 months!! And since XueXiao has been the bane of my existence ever since i discovered it, I decided to make a top 10 list of them!

So these are (in no particular order) my favourite (song)xuexiao fics:

- the backyard is full of bones by @veliseraptor A thoroughly enjoyable what-if with Xiao Xingchen being a bit smarter about the wounded man he found. Extremely well paced and written, it eases into the enemies-to-lovers dynamic perfectly, and it depicts characters so believable and well-rounded that it practically feels like canon.

- I promised you a garden by @lady-of-the-lotus  A short snippet into an alternate timeline where Song Lan’s consciousness is trapped in a paperman and forced to bear witness to the yizhuang’s (very sexy) domestic life. Cute and frustrating and very, very satisfying. (One of those where Song Lan’s not having a good time, which might be one of my favourite tags).

- Now that I see you by @10holmes​ Don’t usually go with unfinished projects, but this one is an absolute treasure which’d need to work very hard to go awry, so of course I’ll have it here. We have a double canon divergence with Not Blind!Xiao Xingchen, and Amnesiac!Xue Yang!! Which make for a delightfully angsty relationship as they both tiptoe around each other, all while battling with internal turmoil, conflicting morals and a misplaced low sense of worth. A fic absolutely worth keeping track of.

- The prisoner of Jinlintai by @fieri-sentio-et-excrucior  A rather recent project that had us in tethers for a month and a half (!) with the very sexy prompt of Xiao Xingchen being framed and arrested by the Jin, while a certain guest disciple with a sweet tooth was still around... Another enemies-to-lovers with a wonderfully natural evolution in their relationship, with the extra treat of a rich and entertaining world building that could easily sprout a few spin-offs.

- Nothing but a way of shading blood by @veilchenjaeger​  This one is very recent, but it shoot up to my top 10 immediately, both for the marvelous writing style and the perfect way they executed the prompt. It provides just the right amount of anguish in Xiao Xingchen, before and after certain discoveries are made, and the diplomacy game with Jin Guangyao and his minion just adds an extra flavour in an already spicy mix.

- Heaven has a road but no one walks it by @silvysartfulness​  The second (and last) ongoing project here, but just as deserving of the spot. This book-sized treasure is a long journey of (re)discovery, of a slowly kindling relationship with wonderful twists and turns. The slow pace balances out perfectly with some intense (and, in one occasion, thriller-like) action scenes. Also, it was the fic that made me see SongXueXiao with a more favourable opinion.  

- lie back and let me unlock you by @veliseraptor  A short and extremely sexy xuexiao roll in the hay, with the amazing prompt of Xiao Xingchen being (quite shamefully) aroused at the thought of his old enemy Xue Yang, and good ol’ Chengmei offering to rolplay. The result is even more unbelievable that what you can imagine!

- On the topic of cold by @andreri25  A cute little snippet in the early days at Yi City, where Xiao Xingchen almost dies from hypothermia and Xue Yang has to keep him warm. So what if he takes advantatge? Daozhang won’t remember, and he does need some hot friction after all! It’s wicked and cute in equal parts, because Xue Yang starts off really concerned (even if he wouldn’t admit it or know why, really) but changes gears when the danger is over...

- Final victory by @fieri-sentio-et-excrucior​  A funny concept very well executed, particularly in the emotional response both Xiao Xingchen and Xue Yang give at the different turns of the plot. Daozhang discovers that his old enemy is in town, killing people, and after recovering from the surprise, Chengmei offers his help to hunt him down. Cue some well-placed deceit and a cruelly cute happy ending.

- it hurts at first (but it ain’t that bad) by @veliseraptor Yet another change in dynamics with Xiao Xingchen discovering his mysterious friend’s identity, if only this time because Xue Yang flat-out tells him (well, he thought he was done for anyways). What follows is a wonderful deluge of arguments, moral dilemmas and Xue Yang’s particular brand of twisted social logic that allow a deeper (and less deadly) reprise of their last canon conversation. Just lovely.

Which one of those I like best? I don’t know. I don’t care! They are all fantastic.

AND, since this year was also the first I started actually writing some original content, and not only devouring other artists amazing works, lemme put them here as well >w<

- Phantom Threat The foregone conclusion of all the fix-its that have xuexiao become an item (sans hidden identities, that is), in which Song Lan arrives at Yi City and does what he should have done in canon and talks directly with Xiao Xingchen, to reveal the terrible secret... which he already knows about.

- To carry a bit of yesterday A small slice of life in the Three Year Bliss, where Xiao Xingchen wants a family portrait and despite being quite contrary to the idea, both a-Qing and Xue Yang end up complying. It has amazing art by @wrathyforest​, too!! ^-^

AND FINALLY, just a few non-xuexiao fics I also loved to the moon and back, but have little-to-no connection other than belonging to the mxtx universe.

- You’re stuck with me by LikeAFlamingKiss_Consume  A delightful jadecest with dark!Lan Xichen (well, dark!Everyone and their mother, it’s a fucked up AU) and a reluctantly horny Lan Zhan.

- Blood array by @giraffeter​  Though it could technically be a xuexiao fic, the actual fucking here is between Demonic Gremlin Team Extraordinaire! Xue Yang and Wei Wuxian, sooo... doesn’t count. The fic is entertaining, very sexy and their interaction is marvelous to follow!

- Despite warning signs by @extrapenguin​  A surprisingly cute and light-hearted Xue Yang/Mo Xuanyu little treat, from their days as Jin disciples. A happier alternative reality for both of them, with fluff and smut in equal parts, which never fails to make me smile.

- Qi Rong’s day off by @ahintofblue​  Too bad the only tgcf fic to make the cut is a very, very nsfw alternate outcome of the mausoleum scene from book 2, but what can I do? The writing’s so smooth and engaging, it’s rough and cruel and I loved every single minute of it.

I have the gnawing feeling I’m still forgetting something, either here or in the xuexiao part... but until I discover the way to check which fics I left kudos in, I either go through an ocean of titles from my ao3 history page (that won’t even let me filter!!!) or I just wait for my two braincells to click one day. Oh, well!

Thanks for reading, and to all writers, THANKS FOR WRITING!!! I love you all. Have a happy new year!

#post reordening #setting ao3 side-blog #how does this work #XD

[chupenguin]

MDZS Grishaverse AU: Wei WuXian students

Mo Xuanyu and Xue Yang live in the Burial Mounds with the other grisha refugees

@madness-maybe-managedged tagging u in case ur interested!!!

A little part of the fic this is part of under the cut:

When Xuanyu entered in the glade he was following the voices, (t the forest voices no, that one was the one you wouldn´t want to follow, he had learnt it the bad way), he followed Xue Yang and Zizhen voices, in the silence of the Burial Mounds it was easy to find once he left the house behind. 

“Why are you taking so long?”  “Well, you can go home and I´ll poison the fucking water source keeping us alive genius” 

Xue Yang voice broke the silence, loud and high like ever, he´s always the first one he notices when he arrives at home. 

“You´re so slow!”  

“Zizhen if you keep complaining he´s going to poison your food,” he said as he walked closer to them. They were sitting by the river, the laundry basket next to them. Laundry day was fine most of the time, one of them went to the river and took care of it but, if it was Wei WuXian laundry the one in the hamper... well, most of his clothes ended there after an explosion or some kind of damage during an experiment...  

So, it was team work to clean it, a squaller to keep the water from running and an alkemi to put whatever toxic substance was on it away from the water. 

“Oh, Saint it stinks!” Zizhen scrunched his face, clearly disturbed. “What is that?”  “Sulfur,” a yellow cloud raised from the water, slowly guided by Xue Yang´s hands. “And I can assure you that we don´t want it in out lake” 

“No welcoming for me?”  “If you distract the kid I´m drowning you Xuanyu,” Xue Yang grabbed one of the bottles, eyes nailed in the yellow cloud before guiding the thing to the recipient. “We´re almost done, this is the last one”  “How long...” 

“Wei WuXian covered everyone in acid so, all the morning,” the pile of clothes by their side is quite big. “Fucking finally!”  He closed the last one and Zizhen collapsed, breath heavy and sweat covering his face. 

“I hate laundry day”  “Lan WangJi wasn´t here?”  “He´s helping his husband in the village, the lab is a mess... they´re going to need to reconstruct most of it” 

Xue Yang accepted his hand and Xuanyu pulled him to his feet, “Welcome back” 

It was nice going back, even if he had been away just for three days, searching for materials in the next village.  

“I missed you...” after all, it had been years since they travelled past Yilling. “And I got presents” 

“For me?” Zizhen jumped to his feet, the frown changing into a smile. “I get a present too or its A-Yang privilege?”  “Well...” it was... really Xue Yang privilege and judging for Zizhen face, he knew it. 

“Yeah, I knew,” the kid stretched his back like a cat and it made an awful crack. “I´m out”  He leaved, leaving them alone with both the laundry and little vials of venom. 

“So... I have privilege?” he asked, arching an eyebrow. “Interesting, now help me to bring this home”  Xue Yang put the box with the bottles on his hands, it was heavy, how much whatever had they pulled out of the clothes? He was gone for a few days and Wei WuXian almost killed everyone? Like, that was normal but this time it seemed worst. 

“Okay, let´s go,” and Xue Yang lifted the basked with the laundry, resting it against his hip. “I´m dying for a cup of coffee”  “Me too....” 

They walked away from the lake, following the same path that Zizhen did before (but Xuanyu was pretty sure about the kid keeping an eye on them behind a tree), the midday sun sunning above them. 

“You know, when I discovered that I was grisha I never thought that I would end up like this” 

“Living in a dead forest?”  “Doing laundry for a Saint,” but he was smiling as he turned around, moved his hands across the sleeve of Xuanyu´s shirt where a nail had cut it. The rust that had stained the shirt parted from it, floating in the air in front of Xue Yang for a second before he moved it into a tiny bottle. “I always thought that I would be a powerful grisha, casting spells and creating deadly poisons or something like that” 

“Well... you are powerful,” being Wei WuXian right hand was pretty cool. “Maybe not the kind of powerful you expected, but powerful” 

“I don´t really know what I expected...” 

“Joining the army? Being a Tavgharad?”  

That made Xue Yang stop on his feet, a soft chuckle leaving his lips as he shakes his head. 

“Armies are stupid and useless, what´s so great about dying for a country?” 

“Honor?”  “And what´s so great about honor?” 

“I don´t know, but most men would die for it,” Xuanyu waited for Xue Yang to walk to him again, Xue Yang eyes fixed in the forest in front of them “Would you die for your country?”  “Oh, please no,” Xue Yang laughed, a soft snort scaping his lips. He looked good, as soon as summer arrived Xue Yang changed. His skin tanner and the ends of his hair brown instead of black, he smiled more and was livelier.  

Summer suits him, Xuanyu thought as they leaved the lake behind.  

“I wouldn´t die for anything or anyone” 

“Not even me?” the question was a joke more than anything else, but as he asked it... he wasn´t really sure about what he wanted for an answer. 

“For you?” arching an eyebrow Xue Yang smile widened. “Xuanyu, I would never die for you”  Oh... 

“I would live for you”  Oh... 

“After all, isn't living harder than just dying?”  As he skipped from one rock to another, jumping along the road... Xuanyu froze. Xuanyu froze as he observed Xue Yang walking away from him, feet silent against the ground and hair detangling from his messy bun and...  

The sun shone above them, painting gold their walk back to the house. 

“So... are you telling me where have you been?” Xue Yang asked as he threw a sheet over the rope, hanging it to dry. “It´s been lonely without you”  “It was just a few days,” Xuanyu leaved the box in one of the stone benches that surrounded the garden, helping Xue Yang with the laundry. “Wei WuXian wanted materials that they don´t have in Yilling”  “He didn´t told me....”  “What? Would you have wanted to came with me?” 

“Of course!” he said it almost like Xuanyu doubt offended him. “It seems nice! Traveling around together you know”  If Xue Yang continued to say things like that all the time, he was going to die. He was so... straight forward, just with him, just for Xuanyu. He said it like he didn’t even realize the meaning behind his words, like he was just saying that it was raining. 

#mdzs #mo dao zu shi #the untamed #cql #the grandmaster of demonic cultivation #xue yang #xue chengmei #mo xuanyu #xueyu #xuemo #mo xuanyu x xue yang #mxy/xy #rare pair #mdzs fanart #chu draws #mdzs modern au #xueyu au #grand master of demonic cultivation #grishaverse au #grishaverse

[enden-k]

how are you doing with the fall down to mdzs hole?any favorite moment so far? and more importantly, your opinion on the juniors? (I love them btw💕)

im watching the animation with my best friend rn, hes over for the next days <3 im almost finished with the second book and so far (in the books) one of my fav moment is when lan wangji tied up wei wuxian with his forehead ribbon, they played tag, wwx kissed him and lwj knocked himself out KABXJC also my fav moment is. basically the entire yi city part. the story of a-qing, xiao xingchen and xue yang made me so unbelievably sad, i was tense all the time bc i was scared for a-qing and that xue yang will find out the truth. i absolutely love xiao xingchen and xue yangs destructive mad love for him is both interesting and terrifying bc xue yang is such a complicated character for me, a bad guy you can also understand...its hard to describe but uhh anyway I LOVE XIAO XINGCHEN AAA I WANNA CRY FOR HIM AGAIN 😭

in the animation we just reached episode 10 i think? im curious if a-qings memory will sadden me as much as it did in the book once it happens. but i really really love it so far, i basically love every scenes with lwj and wwx and also the chaotic trio (wei wuxian, jiang cheng and nie huaisang) whenever they showed up in the beginning 😭 idiots 💕

also i love the juniors sm!!! theyre all babies 😭😭😭 in the book it felt like wei wuxian and lan wangji are the dads watching over their children akshxkx 😭💕

#i love love LOVEEEE mdzs.....it gives me sm life rn... #💕💕💕💕💕 #myountalk #reply

[abigail-nicole]

tgcf liveread 3

archiving my live-tweeting of the novel Heaven Official's Blessing / Tian Guan Ci Fu, one of the most delightful reading experiences I ever read, because I reread this live-tweet series constantly because HuaLian brings me all the joy in the world. check my tgcf liveread tag for the full series if you want. please purchase official licensed copies from Seven Seas! liveread from 3/27/20:

resume but with my kindle app settings changed in honor of my first ever visual migraine. Also thanks to @thegeekgene & @snarp who put this all in one ebook for me!

Oh look: there’s the one brain cell in the heavenly realm

Listen I’m a big fan of shi qing xuan rn

This passage drives home a lot of points about Xie Lian’s personality as Good Boy:

“I’ll pay him back with my entire life” like............ getting married........Hualian

MXTX loves Angry Brothr relationships & Mu Qing being v Jiang Cheng here

So both these dumb babies ignore Xie Lian for a couple of centuries but then get mad at each other for ignoring him

Hua Cheng: i Heard someone was being mean to my boyfriend

me: *swoons*

I know I read this yesterday but Hia Cheng kidnapping Xie Lian so they could apologize to each other I could read EVERY DAY

No hua cheng in a murderous rage is so sexy oh no

Xie Lian: Im not prepared for someone to touch me back. please send help

“oh honey it’s fine I can deal with my own shitty family ty ily”

Hualian both like “insult me all day but IF YOU INSULT MY BOYFRIEND I’LL DESTROY YOUR FACE” which is ESPECIALLY charming from Xie Lian

I really appreciate them translating Qi Rong like this

Glad we get the clarification that Xie Lian is also real OP

I love when Xie Lian is like “this certainly can’t be the same-name person i had an important relationship with in the past” and it ALWAYS IS

just think about how Hua Cheng is feeling in this scene !!!! watching his loved one go through so many emotions, watching Xie Lian’s calm exterior finally crack!!!! how much Feelings

this is how Xue Yang would be if he were actually a Yiling Wei disciple

COME BACK TO GHOST CITY WITH ME is what xie lian WANTS him to say

what an adorable exchange between our heroes??? The way their cases are tender & warm while also being full of pretty intense horrors??? they manage to be so shy & sweet & Seen to each other while being so fierce & mysterious to everyone else??

the pacing in this book is truly incredible

Also the dynamic of hualian is so good??? So kind and giving & bringing out the best in each other??? Solving important mysteries but also eating domestic dinner together??? I’m tears

continued in part 4!

#tgcf #tgcf liveread

[parlerenfleurs]

Hi!

I'm the anon with the Xue Yang&Wei Wuxian ask from a while ago.

Thank you for answering. I am a big Wei Wuxian fan too and I don't like it when he is misunderstood on purpose,to raise up the moral quality of other characters.

But about screenshotting. You've opened my mind!!

So,to me,screenshotting is the worst that you can do. Take someone's words out of context and criticize without ever interacting with the person. Rude anon asks are way above that,in terms of ethics. And angry reblogs would be preferable,instead.

BUT. apparently this is normal practice? So I really want to know now,is it a me thing or a cultural thing?

If you are also from the US I guess it would be a cultural thing. But if you are not,then it could be strictly a me thing,possibly?👀🤯🥸

(about finding your post: it was just in one of the common tags,so it was easy to find)

Well, for starters, no country/culture is a monolith, so don't worry about that anon, but no I'm not from the US, I'm French.

I have no idea if it's a me-thing, but I suspect I've been on the internet longer than you, and it's very simply that I value my tranquillity above drama. What I can tell you is that if you do want to talk about what someone said but you disagree with, if you put their name with it, then it's rude because it paints a target on their back while they may never know where it came from and don't have a chance to respond, or simply block. That's where the angry anons can come from.

On the other hand, cropping out the name is considered the polite and decent thing to do, yes. Same principle as making your own post instead of derailing someone else's.

We can never all agree and sometimes it's cathartic to just... Have a good laugh/sarcasm-fest about something we read that someone said.

But life is too short to care about a few words taken out of context if none of the angry feelings are making their way to me, you know? Social media is largely designed to maximise engagement, and to do that it chiefly exploits anger. It's profitable for sites if users get angry and just... respond.

Anger is paralyzing in the long term, very bad for the body and the brain, and reacting without thought is how useless drama happens. Especially if it's about a fictional character! There are more worthwhile causes to put energy into.

That's why I largely don't follow mdzs blogs. There is too much drama, and I just want to enjoy a good book that brings me joy. An angry reblog would not bring me joy. It would be useless to both parties AND put drama on people's dash. But venting about some words might be a relief, and it has nothing to do with me because they had the decency not to come and bother me about their opinion, that is irreconcilable with mine, so I don't care.

I would advise you to reconsider why you feel it's more ethical to confront someone than to just have your own emotion in your own personal space. When you think about it, this is the difference between shit-talking something you overheard with your friends and going in a stranger's face to start a fight. Which is more ethical? Which is a better use of one's energy and time? Of course a constant state of criticism is toxic and disagreeable, but the baseline is not to make it someone else's problem.

Seems to me you feel like your words, written thoughts, are a part of you, and thus if they are "taken" in this way, and you don't know what they become or how people react to them, then you lose then and thus a part of yourself. Your ego feels threatened, and I mean that in the most neutral way. We all have an ego that feels threatened all the time. The key is to recognise when it's a real threat to our well-being, or just an eternal immature, attention-seeking part of your psyche with irrational views about how the world functions. You'll have an easier time in life, and on the internet, if you take a page out of Budfhism's philosophy, and detach your sense of self from such fickle things as words.

Yes, words have power, and that's why I vastly prefer not to receive angry anons or reblogs, but words are not "me". So it doesn't matter what someone says about them, with no name attached, in my back.

People will react to your existence and your actions. We all can't help doing that. Commenting on a stranger's appearance/behaviour in public, out of earshot, is okay - loudly telling them what you think about it is not. (Talking about harmless behaviour here, of course you can speak up if someone does something dangerous or rude.) Creating a blog dedicated to making fun of an appearance/behaviour with faces or names displayed is even worse.

In this metaphor, what these people did was the first option, and you're saying that you would find it the moral thing to do to do the second one instead, while I'm just happy they didn't do the third.

People will always react, and as long as they don't make their reaction to you your problem, and you don't in return, then the world is a kinder place.

#Bloom answers #of course the superior course of action is to block and think of something else #but I think that might be a bit much to ask of people who deem it important to defend a character like Xue Yang lol #But we all act less than ideally from time to time it's okay

[lgbtlunaverse]

You know, when i walked into the wider mdzs/cql fandom 4 years late with starbucks in my hand i was generally expecting that the character i was gonna have to bat horrible takes away from me with a hockey stick was gonna be jin guangyao. Maybe jiang cheng. Complex characters in an antagonist role whose complexity tends to be ignored because people want an easy bad guy to point at so they can prop up their own blorbo.

But no! There are so many rancid takes about both of them but it has become startlingly easy for me to avoid them once i knew what to do. I nestle myself mostly into the 3zun/yi city niche of the fandom which are generally (fictional) murder-friendly. Be careful when treading wangxian-only pages. Don't even come near either of their character tags. Avoid the "canon jiang cheng" tag like the plague. (I gotta hand it to 'em calling your character negativity tag canon is a ballsy move.) And. Yeah. Sometimes I can blissfully forget wider fandom has bad takes about these dudes.

No. No the character i have to slap away bad takes from left right and center is fucking nie mingjue.

You wouldn't expect that from a source material where he spends 90% of them time being a corpse. But here we are!

(To be clear everything under this cut is me being extremely salty if you don't want that in your life scroll away! read something else! smell a flower! eat some ice cream! Have a better day than i did! You deserve it)

I understand that it's because i took primary measures to avoid bad takes about jgy that i ended up in the jgy apologism pit and i do really quite like it here, you're all very lovely. But I guess the fandom impulse to need a big bad guy so blorbo didn't do anything wrong propped up and jgs on his own wasn't enough for everyone, and so the reading that nie mingjue is a selfish entitled privileged brute who wanted nothing more than to beat jgy until he acted grateful or subservient enough for his wishes without ever actually trying to empathise with him emerged in a few corners.

I've seen cql and book canon warped and mixed together to perpetuate the worst reading of him possible that would, in either canon taken on its own, look downright ridiculous. (I've often seen people say cql softens his character, but it notably makes him look like a way worse sect leader to jgy because the jin captain harassment was moved to qinghe, where in the book it is basically established that while people still look down on jgy the outright harassment has stopped because they can't get away with it anymore, and only the most subtle gestures of disrespect slip through. People will just move the alternate reality from cql to novel canon with no regard for how it makes several plotbeats no longer make sense. Don't even get me started on the differences between book empathy and show empathy and how they are ignored because one framework lends itself easier to character bashing.)

I've seen claims that killing him was good and a kindness actually, because he was just too bad and dangerous to keep on living. Who knows who he'd have killed if left on his own!! He'd have died in a few years anyway, who cares.

I've seen an offhand assumption from xue yang that the bruises madam jin leaves him with come from nie mingjue being misquoted as some kind of canon hard proof that nie mingjue is physically abusing jin guangyao during their entire sworn brotherhood multiple times in discourse now and it makes me want to start chewing on human flesh. (Also the lan xichen character assasination this implies??? Apparently lan xichen is just standing there while his eldest sworn brother beats the younger one up and, what? Thinks it's a good idea to make them spend long periods of time together ALONE? Tells jgy after the stairs incident that he "shouldn't provoke" mingjue- An actual thing he says!!! Which becomes much worse if this isn't an isolated incident in a tense but otherwise wanted relationship but instead one iteration in a long history of abuse!! So lxc is just doing abuse apologism for years on end here? Ok.)

And the frustrating thing is that, unlike with characters like jc or jgy, who have solidly sized fanbases built up specifically to defend and discuss them with nuance in part as direct reaction to abysmal takes about them, the equivalent for Nie Mingjue is a lot smaller. Wider fandom takes on him tend to vary from a casual shrug of general disinterest to "oohhhh jgy is so evil for killing him i feel so bad 😞" followed by. Very little actual exploration of what makes his character so interesting and tragic. And so I am left with??? Almost nothing??? Most people actually TALKING about him are doing so wrongly and even if they are defending him they are! Doing It Wrong! This sucks! I don't like any of it!

#i don't like 'he was always right and was just a good guy' takes for nmj either grrr let him have depth!! #complaining and whining about fandom #i am whining. to be clear. i am being a whiny little bitch here #if you're one of the people i'm talking about here i'm sure there's nothing wrong with you as a person #and i think disagreeing about blorbos is a fundamental human right #i just sometimes also want to violently bite you. sorry #i'm not tagging this with any official character or fandom tags lol. i'd like to live thank you very much

[cephalopodish]

this is all your fault!!!!!!!

#the untamed #xue yang #xiao xingchen #yi city arc #tagging both of them but it's really just xue yang #realizing consequences for the first time in his life

[veliseraptor]

Given the tags for that post about the detrimental effects of demonic cultivation, and possibly the Yin Hufu/Yin Iron in particular, what bearing do you think that had on Xue Yang during his stint as resident demonic cultivator for the Wen and the Jin, versus doing less and possibly not having the Yin Hufu on him during the first three years in Yi City? Any significant variation between the novel and CQL timeline of events?

ooh this is an interesting one. forgive me for taking approximately ever to answer it! and as always this is kinda me talking without a truly comprehensive knowledge of a lot of cultural context here, just based on, like, what I’ve read and my own interpretive lens, so, grain of salt and all that.

BUT SINCE YOU ASKED FOR MY ONION

in general I’m averse to attributing too much of a characters’ behavior to external influence, i.e. the evil metal made them do it. I just tend to find it kind of unsatisfying and I’m so deeply obsessed with choice (and the limitations of choice, to be sure, but not usually that kind of magical intervention limitation) that I think it just doesn’t make for the kind of story I find interesting.

as far as Xue Yang goes...it’s a good question. I tend to go with “he’s just kinda like that but also consistently fucking around with demonic cultivation since childhood didn’t help, along with all the other things that didn’t help.” I mean, in general I think Xue Yang was sort of set up to fail in all kinds of ways from the get-go, and the use of demonic cultivation is more of a continuation of a tendency than something that dramatically altered him as a person.

a Xue Yang who never touched demonic cultivation I think is still likely to have violent tendencies and a pretty short fuse, basically, though maybe he’d regulate a little better (but that also depends on what’s going on in the rest of his life).

(like, I tend to think, similarly, that there’s a lot of weight as far as Wei Wuxian’s instability to be put on his trauma as much as anything else; I think the way I conceptualize it there’s a certain degree to which demonic cultivation’s effects on a person’s mental health are more like a finger on the scale than a deciding factor; i.e. if someone is already a little unstable in some way it’s going to make it a lot worse. this would potentially account for, for instance, how much more okay Wei Wuxian seems in the second life, despite the fact that he’s still using demonic cultivation.)

so if Xue Yang is already just sort of...like that, then I think there is potential for a sort of...feedback loop, where it becomes self-perpetuating. I also think to a certain extent in terms of, like, the way that Lan Wangji says that what Wei Wuxian is doing “harms the body” - yeah, probably that’s something that’s happening but Xue Yang is very much on the “live fast, die young” track of how he expects things to go. (really need to get around to writing that fic digging into my extensive feelings about Xue Yang’s relationship to his body because there’s I think a lot there.)

then when it comes to Yi City, when that practice is dialed back, combined with the fact that in general his life gets a lot more stable and he’s just generally...living better, in a lot of ways (happier, less stressed (I think, hilariously enough despite the fact that he’s living with his nemesis, but), and generally just more relaxed...I think are both contributing factors to a certain amount of evening out he does during that time.

basically I guess what I’m saying here is “I don’t think you can blame solely demonic cultivation/the Yin Iron/Yin Tiger Seal for Xue Yang being who he is, but I’m sure it wasn’t helping him either, and maybe he’d be a little more stable without that as a factor.”

as far as CQL versus novel, I’d be inclined to say that the Tiger Seal has much less to do with Xue Yang’s overall everything than it might in CQL, both because (a) his association with it is briefer and seems to be less extensive than it is as a throughline in the show and (b) the novel in general seems to be...more averse to putting weight on an artifact as evil than the show is. I think the novel is just...less inclined to treat the Tiger Seal as generative of evil influence in and of itself.

#conversating #thewasandshouldbeking #xue yang #aggressively headcanons #the sad queer cultivators show #i don't think this counts as meta #it's insufficiently grounded in the text probably

[admirableadmiranda]

People are really out here comparing ONE instance of WWX torturing WC and WLJ (something that is framed as wrong) to YEARS of JC tormenting suspected demonic cultivators and then brushing off JC’s actions. ?????

Yes, sadly. This is a take I have seen multiple times from different people, and it frustrates me every time it comes back around.

I also want to note on Wang Lingjiao, that while yes, she is tortured by Wei Wuxian in that he reverses all the talismans in the area and sends the spirits after them, he does not lay a hand on her personally at all. To him, she is part of the Wens to be taken down, not as personal as Wen Zhuliu or Wen Chao. In addition, no one ever mentions that Wei Wuxian leaves her body as is, but Jiang Cheng when seeing it, shoves the stool leg down her throat till it's in her entire body.

And yes, to an extent what Wei Wuxian does to Wen Zhuliu and Wen Chao is treated as wrong, but it is also treated as what they deserve for what they in particular did to him and Jiang Cheng. I almost get the feeling that Wei Wuxian's particular target of ire is actually Wen Zhuliu, who crushed Jiang Cheng's core and was at the fall of Lotus Pier, as well as made Wei Wuxian fail in his duty to Madam Yu and Jiang Fengmian (he is busy fulfilling debts he does not owe, but that was a whole post by itself), so what he does is the same thing that Wen Zhuliu did to him, break his ward and leave him helpless to do anything to change it. Jiang Cheng breaking Wen Zhuliu's neck and taking over the situation changes the feeling of it from Wei Wuxian's exacted vengeance to Jiang Cheng's hunger to hurt.

One thing these takes rarely mention is that when Wen Chao is tortured to death is that Jiang Cheng is right there too, goading on Wei Wuxian and actively participating. This is not something where Wei Wuxian is doing it all by himself, his sect leader stepped in and took command of the situation and decided that they would torture him to death together. What we can take from this situation is that Jiang Cheng already has no problem with the idea of torture. He could have let Wei Wuxian do his own thing, he could have stopped it, but instead he chooses to do it with him and takes pleasure in it.

I could go over all the lines that prove that Jiang Cheng tortures people both off and on screen on very little pretense, he's certainly excited about getting Jin Ling to feed Mo Xuanyu to his dog long before he ever knows that he's actually Wei Wuxian, but people better at metas than me have covered these already.

For me, the part that matters the most to me is intent. With Wei Wuxian, he targets two very specific people and stops after that. The only other torturous act he does is right before the battle of Nightless City where a bunch of people right after the death of the Wen siblings are talking about killing him and the people he protected again in violent ways and there is officially no more time or hope, their last attempt to soothe the mob mentality of the sects failed, and what he does is summon heavy ghosts to crush them on the ground. In contrast, pretty much all of the torture Jiang Cheng does is in peace time, after Wei Wuxian is dead, regardless of innocence or reason, yet for some reason does nothing about Xue Yang, is not even mentioned to speak up. It is contrasted as an action he wants to take, there's no pressure of time or honor to be reclaimed.

I don't know. With some of these fans, you can quote passages from the novel until you're blue in the face and they will still tell you that there's no basis, it's only rumor, Wei Wuxian did it just as bad. It's an exhausting feeling some days to have to hear this and I understand your frustration, anon! What matters to me is that no matter how loud they yell and how much they complain about me using the tags that I do is that this is still a fantastic book, with adaptations that bring in new people every day and this is over all a fun fandom to be in.

The wheel turns, perceptions change, I doubt these opinions will fully disappear, but the stranglehold of them is already loosening. Don't lose heart, anon. We're here and listening too.

#mdzs #jiang cheng #canon jiang cheng #cw: torture #wei wuxian #there's a lot of differences in their actions #in what they do; how they do it; why they do it #to lump it together is a disservice to Wei Wuxian #long post #mdzs meta #ask #anon

[hunxi-guilai]

I just rewatched the scene where wwx murders the supervisory office and lwj and jc walk through and check out the aftermath (ep 20), and i'd forgotten how horrifyingly creative he was when he did that. when jc and lwj examine the bodies and realize every person was killed in a different way? it really takes me back to the idea that he lost something of himself when he was in the burial mounds, something which he did manage to at least partly gain back once he was out of them. because (1/3)

so I know that I’m often tagging posts about Wei Wuxian with some variation of “he deserves the world,” and as a protagonist and hero, he is profoundly inspirational, kind, empathetic, generous, forgiving, self-sacrificing, and righteous, but I feel like we shouldn’t lose the sight of the fact that Wei Wuxian can be fucking terrifying

(for the record, I’m focusing primarily on CQL!Wei Wuxian, since I would argue that his characterizations are different enough across adaptations that they’re fairly distinct)

but like, look at the facts from a perspective that is not one of Wei Wuxian’s loved ones:

he’s an incandescently talented young cultivator from one of the five major cultivation clans (which gives him access to political power, a certain amount of clout, and guaranteed excellent training) 

he walks out of a place that no one, no one has ever returned from alive (again -- the Wen Sect sent literal squadrons of cultivators into the Burial Mounds to try and purify them, and none of them returned)

he's picked up demonic cultivation (already yikes, considering the fact that of all the people in the cultivation world, he has the raw, innate talent to be absolutely devastating with this power. Also, guess who else does demonic cultivation? THAT’S RIGHT, WEN RUOHAN, AKA WHO EVERYONE’S FIGHTING RIGHT NOW)

friendly reminder that one of the signature moves of demonic cultivation is weaponizing the bodies of the fallen against their former friends/comrades/family 

he single-handedly decimates multiple Wen patrols and outposts

he has an incredibly high charisma modifier (by which I mean, he doesn’t display any personality-level insecurities that could be exploited the way, say, Jiang Cheng can be riled up)

he appears to give zero fucks, regardless of whether you’re a Jin asshole or a literal sect leader

What people see isn’t Wei Wuxian, a lost child, returned against all odds -- what they see is a boy, in possession of an immense power known to corrupt the soul, and no easy way to control him. 

Full disclosure: the first time I watched CQL, I skipped the end of episode 19, when Wei Wuxian drives both Wang Lingjiao and Wen Chao mad. It was viscerally disturbing and psychologically horrifying to watch (mad props to both actors). And honestly? I think we, as viewers, are supposed to see Wei Wuxian’s revenge as something quite extreme and not exactly condonable. He acts under the auspices of revenge -- against the Wen, violence is seen as justice, measured on the bloody scale of eyes for eyes, teeth for teeth -- but it’s decidedly uncomfortable for us to watch, knowing that this level of torture can only be something that occurs on a coldly premeditated level. This isn’t an act of passion -- Wei Wuxian’s revenge on Wen Chao and Wang Lingjiao is an act of cruelty.

Is Wen Chao an asshole, and Wang Lingjiao actively unlikeable? Absolutely. Can we understand why Wei Wuxian would do this? Sure.

Should we absolve him, though, just because we understand his motives? Remember that Wei Wuxian has choice, in this matter -- he could probably trill an atonal shriek on Chenqing and snap their necks quickly, easily (unsatisfying). What horrifies Lan Wangji isn’t the fact that Wei Wuxian sheds blood so carelessly and casually -- what horrifies Lan Wangji is the extent to which his actions seem to glory in the violence and pain they cause.

This whole discussion calls to mind one of Xiao Xingchen’s lines to Xue Yang, nearly twenty episodes later:

Xiao Xingchen: Chang Ci’an, that year, broke one of your fingers -- if you wanted revenge, then cut off one of his fingers, and let that be enough! Or if that’s not enough, cut off two fingers -- ten fingers -- or break his arm! But why would you kill his entire family? Does a single finger of yours require fifty human lives in payment?

Xue Yang’s case is a bit extreme -- fifty lives for a human finger is an equation we can balance ourselves rather easily. But what about Wei Wuxian, in episodes 19/20? Setting aside all the viciously murdered Wen Sect cultivators (that’s a separate conversation about the ethics of warfare, and who can be considered a valid target), how do we balance the scales of Wei Wuxian’s suffering against Wen Chao’s, and Wang Lingjiao’s?

CQL, as a narrative, is heavily preoccupied with questions of revenge, justice, and debt -- how long can one nurse grudges? How deep can your vengeance cut before it’s considered psychopathy? How does one negotiate relationships of debt, and violence, and vengeance? At what point does an execution of justice overreach its moral superiority?

Did Jin Guangyao go too far in murdering his father? Can Xue Yang ever be absolved? Does the entire cultivation world go too far in persecuting the remnants of the Wen Sect? Does Nie Huaisang’s vengeance qualify as justice?

(there’s an incredible sequence in the audiodrama during the second siege of the Burial Mounds, when multiple cultivators shout at Wei Wuxian for various grievances -- their parents’ deaths at Nightless City, a crippled leg -- and Wei Wuxian just looks at them. I’ve already died once, he says. What more do you want from me?

How does one measure, or even begin to repay the ramifications of emotional suffering? Where does justice end, and forgiveness begin?)

CQL pushes Wei Wuxian farther along the morality spectrum towards unambiguously good (which you can read about more in @pumpkinpaix‘s here), but even then, it keeps the scene where Wei Wuxian torments Wang Lingjiao to death (though it’s somehow, uh, less graphic than her original death). Wei Wuxian, the show insists, is not invulnerable to these same questions of vengeance and justice, debt and morality.

#ask and ye shall receive #Wei Wuxian #I know I talk a lot about CQL + themes of narrative / legacy / reputation #equally as important are the themes of vengeance / justice / debt #[pats this show] this bad boy can fit so many ethical dilemmas and deep themes #tw uh war crimes?