#aka i decided to write the scene where jc gets

[carrotcouple]

“We found him!”

Jiang Cheng pressed his lips together to not cry out in pain as he was pushed roughly to the ground. The holes in his trousers made the stone cut harshly into his knees. He tried to raised himself up on his hands but a Wen soldier kicked his head and down he went again, stars in his vision. He was scared. He was angry. Had Wei Wuxian gotten away alright?

If he had then thank God.

“Oh?”

Wen Chao’s voice.

Jiang Cheng grit his teeth, tears stinging his eyes and anger boiling under his skin.

“What happened to the other one?”

“We couldn’t find the other one, only him.”

“Well, this one is good enough. He is just as guilty of his shixiong’s crime,” Wen Chao snickered.

Bastard. The one with crimes was him, how dare he pretend that Jiang Cheng’s family and Sect had committed sins?

“Oi, Jiang Cheng,” Wen Chao’s boot settled down on top of his head, pushing his face into the blood stained stone under him. Jiang Cheng growled. “Where’s your shixiong?”

“Fuck you,” Jiang Cheng snarls.

Wen Chao raises his foot and then slams it down. Jiang Cheng feels like he hears his nose crack. Warm blood fills his mouth. It hurts, he’s scared, he’s furious. He wants to grind Wen Chao to dust and feed his ashes to maggots.

“Listen to this dog bark!” Wen Chao cackles.

Wei Ying please be safe.

“Someone get him up, he’ll be a good exam-” Wen Chao removes his foot, sounding dismissive and uninterested. Jiang Cheng lunges forward, leaping up and smashing his knee into Wen Chao’s face. If he’s going to die he might as well die fighting like his mother did. He’s the son of the Violet Spider! Wen Chao shrieks, stumbling backwards, hands going up to his nose which is now bleeding like Jiang Cheng’s. Jiang Cheng aims his fist towards Wen Chao’s throat.

“Wen Zhuliu!” a shrill female voice screeches.

Molten fire collides into Jiang Cheng’s shoulder and he hits the ground. He rolls to the side, attempting to shoot back up to his feet, but then he’s kicked in the side. He curls up momentarily, but that’s all that’s needed. Blows rain down on him. He grunts in pain and then bites down on his lips, desperate not to give them the satisfaction of crying out.

He’s in so much pain.

It hurts.

A-Niang.

“Take him inside! I’ll make him scream!” he hears Wen Chao shout.

He’d rather die than do something Wen Chao wants of him. Someone grabs him by the hair and pulls him up, dragging him backward. He whimpers, scrambling furiously, trying to get away. He grabs at the hands in his hair, scratching at it to get free. He scratches at arm guards. They continue to drag him, hair coming out of his scalp and then he’s thrown onto a slightly elevated platform of stone.

Before he can orient himself, he’s being pulled to his feet and his hands are being chained to hold him up. The top of his robes are pulled away and his eyes widen.

“What are yo-”

Wen Chao is cackling in front of him, still bleeding from his nose, an ugly purple bruise on his face. He’s holding a discipline whip. One of Yunmeng Jiang’s discipline whips. Disgust, fury and fear wells up inside of Jiang Cheng. The audacity of the man to hold something only a Jiang elder is allowed to hold. But he is also horrified. He knows what Wen Chao is going to do.

Jiang Cheng is the heir of Yunmeng Jiang. A model student. To be hit by the discipline whip is the greatest shame.

Wen Chao raises the whip.

“Wait! Sto-” Jiang Cheng cries out.

Ice and fire across his chest.

A wail bursts from his lips. He kicks his legs out, arms yanking at the chains, desperate to curl up. Tears streak down his cheeks as agonized screams leave his mouth. He can feel nothing, only flames on his chest, burning a path across his skin. Blood seeps into his brown-gray robes. There is blood dripping down his wrists from how hard he is trying to pull his hands free.

Distantly he hears laughter.

A hand grabs his chin and he’s forced to look at Wen Chao’s face through his tears.

“Let’s hear you apologize for your actions, dog,” Wen Chao says.

“I...hope you rot in hell…” Jiang Cheng grits out.

He is his mother’s son. He will not die begging. He will not beg for a life that he has given up to save one of his loved ones. His sacrifice has been made. There is no point to-

Wen Chao strikes him across the face.

“Wen Zhuliu, teach him what it’s like when people don’t revere me,” Wen Chao spits out.

Jiang Cheng blinks furiously, trying to clear his head. His chest hurts so much. He slowly looks up and sees Wen Zhuliu standing over him.

A-Niang, A-Die…

Wen Zhuliu’s arm lights up with spiritual energy and then before Jiang Cheng can even flinch or close his eyes, it makes contact with his stomach.

Silence.

Jiang Cheng hears something like a deranged wail and then sobbing and it takes him a moment to realize it’s him. His body is cold, like Wen Zhuliu has carved out his heart while he is still alive. An integral part of him has been taken from him. He feels violated and robbed. He wheezes for breath, unable to process what’s going on around him, crying hysterically.

He’s truly lost the only thing that had given him value.

He doesn’t hear Wen Chao and then Wen soldiers laughing at him. He doesn’t feel Wen Zhuliu undo his bonds. He falls into a heap on the floor.

Without his core there is nothing to him.

He’s as good as dead now.

I hope...Wei Ying is safe.

[jaimebluesq]

for the procrastinating wip ask-🛠 and ♻️ (if you don't mind)

Thank you for the ask! :D

🛠Is there a scene or anything in the WIP you are struggling with right now?

Ugh, I have a fic for an exchange that is almost completely finished - I've written it and it's been through beta already! But upon re-reading it, I HATE the last line. I need to re-write it somehow keeping the original thought but making it sound funny, because it doesn't sound funny, but my brain isn't coming up with an option yet :(

♻️A scrapped idea for your current WIP

Warning: Spoilers for The Catalyst (Will try to be as spoiler-free as I can but this will contain hints for coming chapters) The original way the fic was going was for NHS, LWJ, and Wen QiongFeng to go to the Burial Mounds, everything going well with them all getting on famously with WWX and the Wen remnants, and then NHS leaves happily for Lotus Pier where he reunites with JC, and they go to a night market thing where they come across a woman who sells prophetic fans, who gives NHS one that gives a completely un-subtle foreshadowing of the climax of the story, and everything keeps going well. And this ended up being SO BORING, and something was MISSING. And then I read a post about kinds of stories and plot arcs, etc, and I saw mine in one of them and it gave me the HUGE HINT of where I'd gone wrong. And thus I scrapped (aka, pasted in my Discard file) 17k of writing, went back to the Burial Mounds Arc pt 2 (aka after the meeting with Madame Wen, what will begin in the next chapter), and found an unfired Chekov's gun that provided the perfect place to divert from the original story. Where it's going now I feel is so much stronger! However, when all this originally happened, I was REALLY discouraged by having to cut so much and re-write a whole section, and it dimmed my enthusiasm. It's actually the reason why the fic has been stalled for some time - which in itself is the reason I decided to start posting it on AO3 as a WIP, to give myself the kick in the butt to continue/finish it.

[travalerray]

🖍🤔🤡🛠 from the wips ask game

Thank you for the ask!!!

🖍Post Any sentence from your wip

It was a tiresome job to drag oneself from the wreck of one ship onto another smaller one and painfully waddle to a foreign country.

~ The Collection of Turmoil

🤔What’s a story you’d love to write but haven’t even started yet?

Oh there are many—both fanfictions and original ones. One is where the MC is a wanderer in a sci fi setting where humanity has discovered multiple inhabitable planets and settled there to save the earth (Station zero) from overpopulation. They are an outlaw who is usually on the run from the government and uses dubiously ethical means to keep themself and their horse going by replacing their and their horse's parts with machine parts continuously. The plot of the story is about a strange organism that is mimicking the voice of humans and trapping them in their homes and making them turn entirely to machines and forget their own lives and creativity, turning them into something horrific. When the protagonist hears it, they hear strange garbled words like an AI, repetitive chunks of whatever they have scrounged from human databases—very different from what the patients claim to be hearing. I don't have most of the plot thought out yet, but..... there's a thought.

🤡How many Wips are you actively working on?

4..technically. I did not count Ghost in the Gentian House because it's mostly abandoned but that's mostly it. I think.

🛠Is there a scene or anything in the WIP you are struggling with right now?

The entire next arc in the Grandmaster of Accidental Time Travel. It has to include a) snakes (I decided to put one symbol for each of the elder generation going with how kite is in Madam Yu's name and depending on who is translating Cangse Sanren—you have many colours or jewels, so Mr shady master gets a snake) b) a murder mystery in present c) hints to a murder mystery in the past (aka one generation back) c) which hints to another mystery another generation back d) a callback to the time JFM, WCZ and LQR nearly died during a night hunt and got saved by CSSR which bleeds into the present as JC and LWJ nearly die and WWX saves them

Also this needs to hint to the overall drama going on with how the time travel happened with the soul transfer which combines all three of those murder mysteries so—there you have it. A very fantastic idea when I thought of it and very difficult to execute when I actually go about it.

[morifinwes]

wangxian fic rec list!

aka in which i read fics, write some recs down for aamna and share them!! they're all wangxian fics and uhh @yibobibo i hope you'll like them!!

modern

wolf devours playboy bunny by @greenteafiend (5K, werewolf!lwj, getting together, idk if anyone needs to know that but there's nudity just not uhh explicit)

Lan Zhan has wanted Wei Ying as long as he has known him, and the worst part is that he thinks Wei Ying could want him back.

Too bad he could never in good conscience let himself go there—Wei Ying has a debilitating fear of all things canine, and once a month, Lan Zhan is the exact, precise thing that Wei Ying’s nightmares are made of.

Aka, Lan Zhan is a werewolf.

between the lines by @jywait (19K gaming au!!!, i'm always down for a good gaming au, lwj is the best aksks he's such a good boy)

☆yilingpatriarch☆: pls...give me some face, help me fight these monsters...I'm gonna die

Bluetooth: no.

"You have died." The screen said, and Wei Wuxian threw his hands up in frustration.

resonant frequencies by chinxe (15K, college au, fake dating au, tw mention of cheating but it's brief and no one was cheated on i promise)

In which Wei Wuxian decides that the best way to deal with being in love with Lan Wangji is to pretend to date him for three weeks.

It goes about as well as can be expected.

drift compatible by windoworwhatever (5K, poetry, fluff, drunkji, getting together, college au)

"It was just a fact of life. The sky was blue, university stipends for graduate students working in TA positions barely covered rent, bisexuals cuffed their jeans, Lan Wangji had a massive crush on Wei Wuxian, and spent his time pining and writing research papers about gay subtexts in ancient poetry."

OR

Lan Wangji is in love with Wei Wuxian, and everybody knows, except Wei Wuxian.

the bunny next door by detailsinthefabric (43K, this is mostly fluff and very light angst, and they were neighbors!!!, rabbits!!, aka wangxian's bunny children, this is... so cute i just have to rec it)

Lan Wangji did not know what he was doing. He did not know what he was going to say. He was frozen in place, puzzling over the situation. Maybe he had made the man uncomfortable, which is why he wanted to leave? But his tone had still been so friendly—maybe…

“Would…” he paused, swallowed, forced the last words to come out of his suddenly parched mouth, “would you let me pet him?”

-------------------------------------

Lan Wangji, who doesn't know how to socialize and whose icy demeanor scares everyone away, lets down all his defenses when he meets the bunny next door...oh, and also its owner, Wei Wuxian.

leading tone by silencemostofall (32K, everyone is a music student? or something like that akskk, curse fic, tw panic attacks, tw child abuse, small scene of drunkji, wwx has low self esteem, bro this was so painful to read)

The first time you touch someone you're fated to love, you leave a mark on their skin. If they will love you in return, they'll mark you where you touched them. The deeper the color, the deeper the connection.

Wei Ying has no marks at all.

public places, private thoughts by leahelisabeth (for the love of camelot) ( 8K, cherry magic au, getting together with like... immediate upgrade to fiance status, the author is wrong i crave good wangxian cherry magic aus even tho i haven't even watched cherry magic)

Wei Wuxian had heard the story of course. It had made its rounds through his high school and followed him into his college days. He didn’t think there was any possibility it was true. Virginity was a social construct, invented by creepy old men to exercise dominance over women. The idea that a simple lack of sexual activity before the age of thirty could give one magical powers was absolutely ludicrous.

Wei Wuxian believed this until the morning of his thirtieth birthday.

AKA the Wangxian Cherry Magic AU that absolutely nobody asked for.

i'd be all right (if i could see you) by @thirtysixsavefiles (16K, this was nice, i read this at 6am but it was cute, (while writing this post i must admit i don't remember anything but 6am-me said it's good))

The younger Lan brother is something of an enigma on campus; while Lan Xichen can sometimes be seen in the company of other graduate students or conducting a seminar, Lan Wangji appears to spend all his time in class or in the library. He doesn’t drink. He doesn’t smoke. He doesn’t attend social events. He doesn’t do anything for fun, as far as Wei Wuxian can tell, and it’s driving Wei Wuxian just a little bit up the wall.

Or, Wei Wuxian convinces Lan Wangji to come to a house party, and then they're assigned to the same group project. Wei Wuxian tries his best, but he is not in possession of all the facts.

axe on leg by itszero (4K, i still don't get why wwx did that but it was nice seeing him jealous for once, jealous!wwx, lwj i love you....)

Wei Wuxian pressed his face into his pillow and screamed. He paused to take a few deep breaths, partially hindered by the pillow, and listened to the sounds of Nie Huaisang slurping his iced coffee, from his seat on Wei Wuxian's desk chair.

Having caught his breath, he resumed his screaming and did not stop at the sound of his dorm room door opening.

"What's wrong with him?" He heard his brother, Jiang Cheng, ask.

The slurping stopped. "He's an idiot."

"He's always been an idiot. Why is he bothered about it now?"

"He forced Lan Wangji to go on a date," Nie Huaisang replied, shaking the ice cubes in his drink.

"Okay and…?"

"With someone else." The slurping resumed.

Wei Wuxian, in all his glorious dumbassery, convinces his boyfriend to go on a date with someone else.

these two most powerful by @stiltonbasket (4K, amnesia, wangxian with children!!!, aksksk this was adorable, dadji!!)

When Lan Wangji went to bed last night, he was alone in a tiny guest room with nothing but the howling of the wind in the mountains and his own lonely thoughts for company.

 

But when he opened his eyes in the morning, Wei Ying was asleep beside him.

 

(In which Lan Wangji loses twenty years' worth of memories after a night-hunt gone wrong, and his life as a doting father and husband continues without a hitch somehow.)

good things come to those who wait [but i ain't in a patient phase] by @cerlunas (4K, getting together, pining lwj)

Lan Wangji can't take it anymore.

 

“I love you”, he says, and god, it feels terrifying. “I’ve been in love with you for a long time.”

“Lan Zhan…” Wei Wuxian starts, but Lan Wangji doesn’t want to hear it.

He grabs his cup and drinks everything. He doesn’t know what face Wei Wuxian is making at him right now, and it’s okay. 

“Lan Zhan!” Wei Wuxian repeats louder, but it’s too late. He is already falling asleep.

Or, even after 13 years, Lan Wangji is still in love with his best friend. Maybe it's time to open up.

wei ying, will you marry m- oh my god he swallowed the ring! by selene210 (2K, marriage proposals, crack, marriage proposals but.. they go wrong)

“A ring?”

And indeed it was. The ring Lan Wangji was going to propose to Wei Ying with. That the man had now choked on.

“You swallowed it.”

“It was in my soufflé! Why did you put a ring in my soufflé Lan Zhan- oh. oh”

of glittery valentine's cards by @soft-fics (3K, valentine's day, this was adorable aksk, a-yuan best boy!!)

Lan Zhan didn't want to know what his best friend had planned for Valentine's Day; his heart would simply not be able to handle it. When his son tells him that he made Wei Ying a Valentine's Day card, though, Lan Zhan decided to bring it over anyway.

of coffee and white tea by @soft-fics (9K, fluff, lwj doesn't like coffee, wwx buys him coffee, then they switch drinks, again and again and again, the staff ships it lmao, tbh jc shouldn't have done that like wtf)

For the fourth time this week a stranger orders him a cup of coffee. Lan Wangji wonders how exactly to tell this man to stop ordering him coffee he doesn't even like. Turns out, buying the other white tea and switching drinks is not the best way to go about it

canon setting

on the importance of restraint (or lack thereof) by nixthothou (4K, in which sizhui snaps, i love that boy, no like seriously he's the best boy)

Lan Sizhui does not usually find himself in the company of Sect Leader Jiang.

Suffice to say, Lan Sizhui's feelings toward him are conflicted.

lan wangji is wei wuxian's baby by lilycs (3K, i was craving fluff while reading this, lwj my beloved, drunk!lwj)

Lan Wangji gets drunk from barely a cup of alcohol, becoming a whiny baby and asking his husband for cuddles.

one of our own by glitteringmoonlight (8K, wei wuxian & lan sect, 5+1 things, in which they learn to love him, they're all part of the wwx protection squad lead by lwj, wangxian isn't the focus but !!! THIS)

Times change, but some people remain the same.

The Lans are nothing, if not aware of this.

For one of their own, they will stand against the world.

Or, 5 times the Lans defended Wei Wuxian, and the 1 time he was there to see it happen.

so why not crack your skull when the mind swells by @greenteafiend (13K, love curse, post cql canon, curses, getting together, fluff, so much fluff, lwj tries to talk about his emotions!, lwj pov)

Lan Wangji detects the curse trying to curl through his heart meridians like smoke. A love curse, then. It must have been cast remotely somehow to have found him in his bed in Cloud Recesses. No matter. Lan Wangji crushes it easily, enveloping it in his spiritual energy, and then squeezing. Curse averted, Lan Wangji closes his eyes and goes back to sleep. He thinks no more of it.

Two days later, Wei Wuxian arrives in Cloud Recesses.

Or, Wei Wuxian is cursed to feel terrible pain when he and Lan Wangji aren’t touching.

i started from the bottom / now i'm rich by x_los (57K, time travel, fix it, jealous lwj, crack treated serious, god this is so good tho, wwx/wrh & wwx/jgs but like as a joke and it doesn't really happen, but it has its purpose!!)

“First, you get the money. Then you get the power, respect - hos come last.”

 

Wen Qing traps Wei Wuxian in the Demon Slaughtering Cave, but Wei Wuxian isn’t interested in being the beneficiary of the Wen Remnants’ noble sacrifice. His efforts to free himself accidentally send him back to the beginning of the Sunshot Campaign. Coreless but armed with demonic cultivation, knowledge of the future and his wits, Wei Wuxian takes advantage of this opportunity to come out on top of both the war and its aftermath—before either has a chance to happen—by marrying and swiftly burying the cultivation world’s worst men.

Lan Wangji is confused, hurt, and uncomfortably aroused by Wei Wuxian’s improbably elaborate series of Sect-themed bridal negligees.

lead me on through by mrsronweasley (55K, they're in love your honor, arranged marriage but they don't know to whom, basically wwx & lwj want to practice kissing which then goes beyond kissing but not the whole way y'know, lxc the best wingman tho)

"Who do you think your betrothed is?" Wei Wuxian asks, sprawling out in front of Lan Zhan and enjoying the prim thinning of his lips at the question. He shouldn't be sprawling—they're in the library, for one, and Lan Zhan is studying, for another—but he can't help himself. Wei Wuxian is a sprawler.

"I do not believe this to be of importance," Lan Zhan responds, without turning his gaze away from his book.

"What!" Wei Wuxian sits up. "How can you say that? Of course it's important! This is the person you'll be with for the rest of your life, Lan Zhan."

[wei-gege-oldaccount]

lwj and wwx only have 2 settings when looking at each other, they are either stupidly in love or stupidly horny. have you seen this post? kenny2234*tumblr*com/post/629515661032521728

Hi Anon!

Firstly, yes I have seen your post, and secondly you never asked for this and I am sorry for that.

I could write about their eye contact alone until the end of time, or at least until I succumb to the laws of entropy. I could just idly agree with you, yes, aha it’s love or lust and move on. But. I can’t. I can’t. I mean, this is a story where so much is told by the things that are not said. And there is a lot that can’t be said, either because it’s a character trait or because of censorship issues. I will try and keep this concise, and to do that I’m just focusing on mutual eye contact, and from LWJ’s perspective. Thinking to the BTS where Wang Yibo talks about how LWJ mostly only expresses himself through the eyes.

TL;DR: I disagree, there’s really more to it than that.

LWJ actively avoids eye contact with WWX until around episodes 6-7. He’s a Lan. He can NOT condone or make friends with this unruly, loud, arrogant, charismatic, irritatingly beautiful man. He has bad ideas about the uses of resentful energy. No matter how intelligent, observant and artistic he is. No matter now much of a prodigy and a skilled fighter he is. No matter how hot he is. No matter what his brother says.

He likes him but he doesn’t like that he likes him.

So LWJ actively avoids direct eye contact with WWX unless it’s a glare filled with the fire of a thousand suns. You know, as a warning.

This is until episode 6/7. By this point, they have fought water ghouls at Biling Lake. Drunkenly shared personal mom info. Used the Lan forehead ribbon inappropriately in the Cold Pond Cave, and had Physical Contact when escaping. WWX has called LWJ his Zhiji already. It’s only when WWX keeps his promise not to talk about the Yin Iron and scares NHS away when he tries to extract gossip that LWJ decides to reappraise him. Only then do we get some eye contact which isn’t laced with contempt or uneasiness (which of course JC is there to witness).

They go off and do the lantern ceremony. LWJ does a smile at WWX’s bunny art. That devastating look he gives WWX as he makes his vow. You can almost lipread LWJ’s brain thinking “marry me now”. LXC was right about him. Despite this, he tries to deal with the yin iron by himself because WWX is The Agent of Chaos after all. But, WWX is not going to let him bear this responsibility alone, because of course he wouldn’t. 

Enter Battle Couple WangXian. They fight the fairy statue, multiple puppets, and the dire owl. Xue Yang happens. They meet famous duo SL & XXC and LWJ & JC totally fanboy over them, and it’s only then, some real Zhiji vibes hit LWJ, albeit with a bit of a sombre mood after WWX’s chat with XXC. My next fave moment of eye contact, I can literally feel LWJ’s stomach butterflies here after they watch SL and XXC leave together:

Whoa, is that us now? I mean, do I dare to even hope that that’s us? 

LWJ decides to leave WWX in Qinghe under cover of darkness and asap. He has to get the yin iron back to Cloud Recesses with a low profile. So we don’t see them together again until the Wen Indoctrination Camp. They do a bunch of worrying and looking out for each other, and then we get the cave scene which has been giffed 4 million times already by others who have done a better job, but I haven’t so I slowed it right the fuck down. Forgive the bad colouring I’m trying not to take too much time over this. You’re right about this one anon.

Then lots of bad. I skipped these gifs because picture limit. In summary, LWJ is hurt and angry, lots of angy stares and sword pointing. How could WWX hurt himself by using these methods?! But then WWX promises he will never use demonic cultivation, and agrees to receiving help. LWJ can chill a bit. Night Hunt on Phoenix Mountain. I left this one out as it’s pretty self explanatory. “I used to think of you as my Zhiji”. “I still am”. Ugh but WWX knows he can’t unless he fully informs LWJ of his situation. It’s bittersweet. THE RAIN SCENE. This is not heart eyes or horniness anon it is pure PAIN. 

Let’s skip to some good stuff. Yiling dinner date! LWJ can handle strict Lan sect punishments, hoards of puppets and fierce corpses but this situation? Not so much. He is so confused by this strange clingy child and the rabbling crowd and here comes his reason for being here in the first place knight in shining amour! (Ur right here anon, pure heart eyes).

Do I put a Nightless City gif here? Do I put the cliff scene here? It’s the most LWJ’s facial muscles move in the entire show and yet I can’t bring myself to gif it. It’s pure agony. Definitely not any longing romantic looks or horniness here.

So moving swiftly on, jumping to ep 2 for the epically long eye contact moment aka when WangXian are reunited. LWJ. does. not. take. his. eyes. off. WWX. until. he. hears. Zidian. crackle. OMG.

Anyway, after the Yin City arc and watching SL walking away with what remains of XXC’s spiritual cognition, LWJ is not holding back now. The amount of eye f***ing after this moment is frankly obscene. I’ll just leave some gifs of that.

I kind of ran out of steam but you get my point. I guess you can boil the other moments down to the fact they love each other? But I don’t know why anyone would want to simplify things like that. I know I’ve missed a bunch of stuff but this is long enough as it is! My opinion about this will probably change too as I’m still fairly new to the fandom. You just accidentally unlocked an Easter Egg with your comment, as it’s what I’m currently nerding out over haha. I’ll shut up now.

[tishinada]

100 Days of Writing – Day 60

Well, I was editing the latest chapter of Dance yesterday and while I finally got it posted, I forgot to write and queue up today’s post, lol. So I’m going to detour from the topic of the Imperial military for something fun and completely unrelated...

Eventually all of the class characters will show up in Dance, even if it’s no more than a passing cameo. Obviously, the SW Ucevi is the MC of the story, and Zas has already had a major role. The best developed after them is the JK and I’ve worked out some things about the JC and the smuggler, all of whom will actually meet Ucevi on either Rishi or Yavin, though they may make “ships passing in the night” appearances sooner. The agent, trooper, and bounty hunter are more general ideas at this point than developed characters.

Some of these are based on actual OCs I ran in game, but decided they wouldn’t become the Outlander (like Zas.) At least two, I created specifically for Dance. One of those is the smuggler, which is funny because I actually have a lot of smugglers, all of them with their own very different backstories.

So, why did I create one just for Dance? Because I got the idea for two or three scenes that I was dying to write which required a very specific background to work. And then realized how this smuggler would then enter the story in a fairly significant way from that point on.

My creation of smugglers is a bit different from how I create backgrounds for other classes, because for me, the big question is how this working class hero acquired a ship. They’re not cheap. You didn’t earn enough for a ship tending bar (unless you were tending bar in a very upscale club where you got massive tips.) It’s possible to have someone inherit a ship or inherit money or have someone buy them a ship, but that takes a lot of the working class hero flavor out of it most of the time. I’ve seen some great takes on that, don’t get me wrong, but I enjoy this one class who absolutely grew up seeing the underbelly of the Republic (or Hutt space.) And is the class that screams at me for an older OC as well.

Once I decide how they get a ship, it’s easy for me to create a background and personality for them. Take Odinoka (aka ‘Noka) who is the one I’ve written about, including the story of how she got a ship. She’s very much a working class hero. She doesn’t have a tragic background, but she was the crow in a flock of pigeons, with an aunt who was a fellow crow. The inspiration was my childhood memory of (mostly poor) people building “unique” cars from several junked ones, often different makes and models, and usually called jalopies. Some of these were actually quite good, too. So, I asked myself, could something like that work for starships, and realized that yes, it could.

So, I created an aunt who was a mechanic on a backwater planet that supplied asteroid miners and stations in their system. Not rich asteroids, just supplying the equivalent of iron and coal. I made the family very conservative in some ways and unable to cope with ‘Noka’s ADHD behavior. The aunt stepped in, which the family found a relief though they publicly disapproved of both Dvora and ‘Noka.

And the ship? Aunt Dvora won the stripped out shell of a light freighter from a former spacer who had gotten addicted to something or other and slid downhill. Not worth much by itself - both sublight and hyperspace engines were missing, for instance. But Dvora worked as a mechanic at the space port, with easy access to surplus used parts - and if they were non-repairable, they could be bought extremely cheaply. Non-repairable often just means it will be too expensive in terms of man hours to repair (I’ve known people who worked logistics type jobs, and that’s commonly the criteria.) But Dvora had time and a young niece who was eager to learn to be a mechanic herself. And if she happened to be the one to classify a few things as non-repairable herself, no one bothered to double check her.

So she parked the ship, cleaned it up enough to move into it and used the money saved on rent to buy parts and continue repairing the ship. ‘Noka spent most evenings after school with Dvora, learning to do the work herself. By the time the ship was more or less ready to take flight again (after a decade,) ‘Noka was between 18 and 20 (I don’t have my notes handy.) I’ve written about this and why ‘Noka left with the ship, now named the Dvora, in “Taking Flight.”

The Dvora was originally held together with shoestring and chewing gum and a bit of mechanical genius and probably should have exploded the first time it entered hyperspace. But ‘Noka knew and loved every inch of that ship and how it was put together and spent most of her profits for the next five or six years replacing some of the iffier parts. She lived off gambling winnings and very low level smuggling jobs and occasionally legitimate work, but it wasn’t until she was in her early 30s that she was relatively financially stable and had enough reputation to get the better smuggling jobs.

And that’s when she landed on Ord Mantell. The very idea of Skavak laying hands on the Dvora? Still can send her into a cold rage.

So, this is how I ended up with ‘Noka. A lot of her personality is the result of her childhood, with Aunt Dvora a huge influence on her. She’s a good hearted redneck who’s a bit of a thrill seeker, loves her ship and space and visiting anywhere new.

(really lovely art of Aunt Dvora and child ‘Noka by @chaosandwonder​!)

Tomorrow, I hope to get back to the Imperial military, but I may revisit some of my other smugglers later if people seem interested.

(Day 59 here) (Day 61 here)

[puppy-phum]

Heads Up 7 Up

post the last seven sentences of your latest project (meta, fic, any other writing)

thank you for tagging me @i-am-just-a-kiddo ♥ these are always so much fun and?? this is a cool concept wow. also i still want to say that you are doing amazing despite the situation! just let yourself breathe, it will come to you again ♥

bc i have several (aka too many) projects going on at the same time, i decided to go with four different pieces, two sentences for each. am also going to interpret the rules as the latest sentences i’ve written for each (my memory is bad tho and my drive for editing never ending).

my pingxie fic that works as my therapy fic currently, consisting of random snippets that are slowly coming together into a full story (a story where death is only a journey, titled for now as “no matter where”): 

“This is his most convincing dream yet. Even the pain in his chest feels like it could truly crush him.”

then my liu sang centered fic that makes my head ache, consisting of his moments in reboot but also some moments beyond that (titled as “how i come to you (beaten, broken, and burning)”): 

“He tries to open his mouth and offer something else to Zhang Qiling, not really feeling like the man should be digging sand when he’s so much more, but before he can say anything, the man has already picked up the equipment and is following Wu Xie down the beach. They’re all happily on their own way, and the indifference shown towards him stings.”

my xicheng giant that is currently very much focusing on jc coming in terms with his newly discovered grief (with the help of other ppl bc he’s not as alone as he thinks): 

““I am sorry to tell you this, Brother Jiang, but you never recover from losing your heart.”

“I know,” he answers. “It is not like I ever expected to live any other way.””

and then one snippet from my pingxie meta/blabbering file where i’m currently trying to gather some thoughts i have on certain scenes in ultimate note (this is related to the moment xiaoge discovers the body with wu xie’s jacket):

“Sometimes I wonder how many times Xiaoge must’ve seen nightmares of Wu Xie dying, especially after the scare this one simple jacket gave him (and then the fact that Wu Xie never learns about this. He’s always very conveniently kept in the dark when it comes to Xiaoge and his worry and feelings; no wonder it takes them decades to get over the pining).”

i hope you don’t mind me doing this a bit differently :’D i just have so much going on and it’s so frustrating that still my brain insists on being a bother and slipping into a strange slump. but that pingxie really is helping bc i can just throw in whatever and then look at it later. 

also thank you to @ashenwren @cross-d-a and @kholran for listening to me talk about these thoughts and fics i have ♥ i appreciate it. and thank you so much, my dear, for always allowing me to just yell :’D i know i do that so, so much. you must be a bit deaf by now XD 

am tagging the ppl already mentioned (if you do write) and then some writers from the network: @candicewright @baixue-temple @wangxianbunnydoodles @wangjiplayingwangji 

and then couple of others: @inkblue-black @merinnan and @extraordinarilyextreme (no need to do this if you don’t feel like it or have nothing to show etc. have a nice day everyone ^^)

[stellahibernis]

Lan Wangji: Out and About

AKA Lan Wangji’s costumes in the Untamed, part 2/9

I’m back with my love for beautiful costumes, more screencaps than I actually need, and some wine, let’s have a look at Lan Wangji’s second (and first blue) outfit! As always, I’ll first write about the costume, and after that how it reflects where LWJ is in his character journey.

He wears this one in episodes 8 to 11 when he goes out on a quest to find more pieces of Yin Iron, trying to escape all the confusing feelings Wei Wuxian caused. Of course, WWX will not let him go alone, and he’s only a little bit annoyed about it.

The Costume

I called his first outfit simple but formal, and this second one is pretty much opposite on both of those points; the silhouette is less formal with one less layer and narrow sleeves, but there are more details, not to mention the fabric itself is less plain. Also, in-universe this outfit cost a lot, you’d feed the whole village for years kind of money.

Above in the first image you see the general silhouette, and below we have a bit more detail in view. (Also please appreciate the soft expression directed at WWX sleeping on the roof.)

The silhouette is a curiously mixed bag when it comes to practicality. The lack of another robe over the sash and the narrow sleeves make it easier for him to move about, appearing more ready to fight if needed. Then there are the long strips of fabric falling down from his shoulders front and back, that are the opposite of practical, and potentially risky, as we see when WWX grabs one of them at one point. They look great while he’s moving, though, which is a necessary consideration in costume design, and often overrides practicality.

I was wondering, by the way, about the hen and the egg situation, whether they put the strips of fabric so that WWX had something to grab, or if he was just supposed to grab something and they were conveniently there. I’m also amused that in episode 8 WWX says LWJ always dresses in white like he’s in a funeral, and he’s wearing blue 😅

The top layer made of the blue fabric is very sheer, you can see the white layer underneath through it, and the bottom part is slit up to waist for ease of movement. That’s common for the layer underneath the sash, you can see it best if the layer below is of different color like here, or from the way it fans out while sitting. With this robe it’s especially noticeable because the blue fabric is very light and easily moves at the edges of the slits.

There’s also the usual Lan Sect cloud embroidery done with white (or very pale blue, hard to say) thread on the lapels as well as the front panel at the bottom. Even though I call this one a blue outfit, there’s still quite a bit of white visible with the layer underneath, the sash, wrist bands, and some detailing.

As I mentioned in the first post, if he has narrow sleeves, there are always fabric bands wrapped around his wrists to finish the look, as you see below. I like that the crisscrossing of fabric happens both at the wrists and in the front of the sash (seen above), it ties the whole look together. In the image below you can also see the fabric in more detail, there’s this subtle pattern of two alternating blues, and it’s very sheer indeed, if you look at the seams. That one took a weaver a lot of time. (Also salutations to whoever actually sewed this outfit, fabric like this is an unforgiving nightmare, and it’s so easy to make the garment pull at the seams.) The lapels and the long hanging strips are made of a different fabric, there’s no pattern in it, and it’s maybe slightly heavier (would make embroidery easier, as well as help with the narrow strips to fall pleasingly. (Also you might have guessed by now that I really like the string talisman scene.)

Let’s consider some more details next from the following image. First, the new head ornament that he’ll wear for the rest of the flashback. This is probably my favorite of his formal hair arrangements (I have an extra soft spot for the laid back present time look we get to see at the Jingshi).

Then we get to the main reasons why this outfit cost an arm and leg, besides the sky high cost of the fabric: just look at the jewelry on his shoulders. On both shoulders there is one large blue stone, another slightly smaller, and a white stone in the middle, not to mention that silverwork. The largest stones are huge, and the same color as the ones hanging from his waist ornament, as well as the ones he wears with his final outfit, so we definitely have a theme there.  Anyway, expensive as hell, and they’re just sewn on the shoulders of the robes he decided to wear on a quest that likely would contain fighting. Also note the silver detailing at the lapel edges, want to guess if it’s made of actual silver thread in-universe? I would say yes, all things considered. Why spare the expense there after the jewelry?

Finally, I want to point at the layers at the collar, we can see four. There’s the top layer of sheer blue, then a layer of white (it’s mostly underneath the blue but you can see a narrow bit on the right, and obviously we know otherwise that the layer below is white. Then there’s another blue robe, and finally a white layer, which I think is the undershirt rather than another robe. 

I should point out that this screencap was chosen because of his tiny smile at WWX on his roof, you guessed it, another scene I like a lot.

The Context

As I mentioned in the first part, in general in the flashback when LWJ is wearing predominantly blue, he’s moving closer to WWX and motivated less by his duty to his sect, and this quest is obviously a key point in that. At the start, he’s perfectly happy to be going alone, he deliberately doesn’t tell WWX he’s leaving even though they both made a promise to Lan Yi to help prevent the misuse of the Yin Iron. Of course, he doesn’t get far before WWX shows up, and he’s genuinely annoyed there at the beginning, just note the frequency of him calling WWX boring. After all, he was hoping to put all the inconvenient feelings aside, and now it’ll be all but impossible.

Incidentally, when we consider Lan Sect in general, only those of higher rank can wear predominantly blue robes. They are those who are responsible for making decisions, and can be trusted to act independently. In light of that, it’s kind of funny that the blue in LWJ’s outfits is generally a sign of him moving away from his sect and toward WWX.

All throughout the quest we see LWJ being annoyed at WWX, but a significant change is that apart from the very beginning, it only happens when there’s a particular reason for it (like WWX grabbing a hold of his robes). LWJ is no longer annoyed simply by his presence (while he rather is annoyed by the mere presence of NHS and JC).

The binding talisman (or whatever WWX ended up calling it) scene is great, because on one hand, we get an absolutely amazingly annoyed look from LWJ (please see below, I’m still laughing), but we might also add that he doesn’t even attempt to break the talisman, just yanks WWX to come along with him. Also, after this he doesn’t actually protest WWX’s presence on the quest, and when the Yin Iron reacts soon after, they’re immediately on mission mode and actively collaborating.

In fact, this quest is when they at first start to become a unit. At the summer school we hear WWX saying he considers LWJ his equal, and while he considers the quest for Yin Iron their common duty, I don’t think he considers them partners in general at the time, and if asked, he’d definitely trust his family first. Similarly, LWJ is used to being independent, and hasn’t particularly looked for company, but during this quest we see him start to trust in WWX and rely on his skills.

The key point in all this is the fight against the dire owl in the forest, where they work seamlessly together. At the start, LWJ significantly asks WWX to put the protective net around the others, which is a clear signal that in this fight he trusts WWX to have his back, but not the others. This is a huge shift for him. Likewise, when the disorientation fog arrives and LWJ is much less affected by it (due to his practice in controlling his temperament, no doubt, which is a Lan Sect practice that WWX mentions helped him at the Burial Mounds in episode 22), WWX doesn’t hesitate to trust his judgment on how to handle the situation (closing his eyes, putting his sword away etc.) We know that WWX has a pretty lofty opinion of his own skills, as he later admits (for a good reason, I’d add), so completely relying on someone who is of similar age with him is a big deal and speaks of how highly he actually thinks of LWJ. It is a major shift where they take the first steps on the road to become the people each of them relies on the most out of everyone in the world.

Another key scene that demonstrates the strengthening of their bond is when they say goodbyes to Song Lan and Xiao Xingchen. There is a pause where LWJ stays looking after them, with yearning in his eyes, and WWX is the one to notice and to call him to go. There is a clear and genuine moment of understanding between them, perhaps of the conflict between freedom and duty, that is a challenge to both of them occasionally (albeit one that takes very different shapes for them).

Even though their bond is now starting to strengthen, the circumstances are pulling them apart, and for LWJ it’s the start of the pivotal conflict between his duties to his sect and his feelings for WWX. At this point, it probably isn’t a too difficult choice for him to leave once he knows the Cloud Recesses may be in danger, but it is obvious he still regrets the parting. We see it clearly on his face when he tells the sleeping WWX that he must go.

My personal headcanon, by the way, is that LWJ composes Wangxian on the way back to Gusu after parting with WWX, at least consciously so. It might have been poking around in his head even before then, but I don’t think he was ready to admit WWX’s importance even to himself any earlier, and I doubt he had his mind in the mood for composing after what happened at the Cloud Recesses. Not to mention, what was he supposed to do while traveling when there wasn’t a certain chatterbox around to fill the silence.

His return to home is of course not at all a fun time, and his duty to his sect calls him back hard. Hence the next time we’ll see him in all white, not having a good time at all at the evil summer school.

(Somehow this one became even longer than the first part?! On the plus side, I managed to cut down the amount of images pretty well, I originally had seventeen screencaps 😂)

(You can find the rest of this series via “lwj costume series” tag below, or through my blog contents page. I’d link for ease of access but the links made it disappear from tags, so. 😒)