#also this is lowkey xiancheng

[burntheupholstery]

(1 of 2) I like how the author chalked up Jiang Cheng. In midst of God like characters of Lan Wanji and his lover, the selfless Yiling Patriach, you kinda always look out for the more humane personas. JC is that guy. He is jealous of his friend but he also cares about him. He would rather his friend not bug him but be pissed when he goes over to bug the pretty dude more.

2 of 2 It might not be said overly obvious, but there is something JC has for WWX that is more complicated than familiar love and less graphic than whatever LWJ and WWX have going on( or is less sticky? Sorry WangXian is so hot, I could not help it). JC is truly a hero of his own story too. I have my own headcanon where WWX and JC make up and JC and LWJ have this on going jealous competition for bb Wei. The ultimate incest bro vs Perverted Husband🤣🤣🤣🤣

Oh, definitely.

My lit-addled brain goes immediately to the idea of ‘godhood vs the human condition’ — y’know, the whole idea of presenting a god-like, perfect figure/character in literature only to deconstruct the myth and show their innate flaws aka their humanity, thereby humanizing them and breaking the myth and in that process showing we’re all the same, the human condition is universal, etc. etc. — but I don’t think that’s the right way to approach a piece of modern chinese literature, since that reading is, I suspect, a rather English-Lit-101 way of looking at things.

These immortals aren’t gods, either, not in the Western sense. So I’m misguided, I’m sure.

That said.

I think MXTX set out with the intention to make LWJ a literal god among gods, the man who is perfect and flawless even off the pedestal everyone puts him on, maybe save some kinky inclinations in the bedroom. And a surprisingly teenage-like tenacity in chasing after his senpai.

As for WWX… I got the impression post-reading that MXTX was trying to go for the flawed-god with him. She succeeded, I suppose?

Anyhow. Among these gaggle of god-people, Jiang Cheng does indeed stand out, not just because of how the narrative portrayed him. His temper is a big, glaring flaw. This relates him to us; and here is where I go into mild bashing-the-novel mode: Jiang Cheng single-handedly rebuilt the Jiang Sect, for 13 years.

By himself. Alone. With a child to care for (Jin Ling), no disciples to help him, no parents to guide him, and a smoldering Pier as his base. 

And he still, still, scrounged up the supplies to lead that siege. That’s why my running theory is that JC didn’t want to kill Lao-Zu!WWX, he wanted to catch him and bring him back and beat some sense into him

Fuck yeah he’s the hero of his own story.

And he’s, oh god, such a classic tsundere in his teenage years it makes me laugh so hard he’s so goddamn adorable.

Yes to the low-key jealousy. So much yes.

It also feeds into my xiancheng hcs, so. Actually in my head Jiang Cheng doesn’t know if he wants to punch Wei Ying or kiss him and isn’t that the best kind of love ok I’ll shut up now

Anon, the relationship between WWX and JC is so complicated. It’s so tangled. You have no— you’ll get the idea soon. There’s literally no way to sort it out. No way.

I love your headcanon, and man I wish I was optimistic enough to think that.

[jiangwanyinscatmom]

I just found a chengxian blog and checked out a fanfic - just to see how they worked around wangxian - I’m always curious and sometimes this kind of thing gives me insight I didn’t realise was present - but jfc, the delusion is real.

Now I know, it’s bad form to go look for this stuff and shit on a ship, and I’m not shitting on the very concept of chengxian. Hell, before the fall of LP, I could even see something? Something unhealthy and all sorts of unbalanced but okay sure. And AUs of course. Either way, to each their own.

But these post-resurrection or even worse, post canon fics are hilarious.

Because suddenly we’re all forgetting just how gone WWX is for LWJ because they have similar interests (music and literature), morals (you know, being good) and have always been equals (in talent) - and instead we have WWX being a miserable drunk and hating CR because LWJ gives in too easily, he doesn’t have enough pushback to stimulate him (are we forgetting how this relationship started?) and it just baffles me.

Why it baffles me is the lack of awareness. Do they actually believe this? I mean, I’ve read some XiYao fics and some of those shippers are very well aware of the effed up dynamics at play. Sure, they mess around with it, give Yao some benefit of the doubt, make a lot of canon divergences, but these guys just see everything through opaque rose coloured glasses and somehow try to justify it and I don’t really know how they function...

Btw I’m a CQL only but with a healthy respect for the other forms but CQL really did mess with minds when you see JC clapping for WWX during the archery thing (albeit with a constipated smile and he didn’t even participate) while the donghua which is closer to the novel clearly shows us that he was upset at not winning himself - this is apparently a very clear sign of his adoration and of course justifies how he basically led to WWX throwing himself off a cliff because the irrational grape would have led to both wangxian falling.

Just🤦🏼‍♀️

I'm dealing with a migraine so hopefully what I put here isn't too mean in regards to this ship.

I don't in anyway care what others ship given that I myself lowkey ship ridiculous things that have no romantic basis in the material (and given I respect the author I see exactly what she means that none other than the purely romantic pairs shown in MDZS are meant to be seriously interpreted as romantic in canon). But hey, I like shallow, I like the effed up dynamic in NieYao and XueXiao and like the shallowness of X!cheng for fun what if's. But you (general you but for the stans specifically) have got to admit when something is just for shallow fun without demeaning the real work itself and hate the main core of it and changing the dynamics to be so wildly OOC because you are personally salty (You look like a major Karen doing this shit and are fucking adults sounding like those middle school shit heads).

I also have a whole fanon conspiracy that Jiang Cheng works as a false love interest and as an unrequited fucked up crush/obsession since I personally feel it adds more to Jiang Cheng's depths in terms of exploration for FAN works.

"Do they actually believe this?"

Yes, they honestly do believe, in all their tiny galaxy brained power that this ship is somehow superior and has romantic chemisty along with needing to have been the focused CP. I will point out it is really not even what I would consider a popular pair given it has just under 2k on AO3 alone for the Western base along with the Untamed/MDZS having the largest audience for Danmei works there. Lofter itself has it's own top 100 ships with Jiang Cheng's most popular being X!cheng by a large margin similar to it's Western stats.

If we breakdown it's rankings for both

AO3: Rank 2 of overall ship works 2020: Wangx!an

Rank 55: X!cheng

with ChengX!an being too low in numbers to rank in.

Lofter overall ship works 2020: Rank 1: Wangx!an (with X!anwang ranking again at 66)

Rank 13: X!cheng

Rank 48: Xiancheng (and yes this is a very important distinction as it denotes the "dominate" one in the pair)

If we were to mesh these together with tumblr stats in a similar way the overall would still be Wangxian ranking high as Rank 1 in the Untamed/MDZS tag, overall ships Rank 13 and the only MXTX pair to be featured.

After that digression, regardless of the interpretations, even with Wang ZhouCheng he himself only played up the sibling aspect of the relationship as was in script, it does not have the supposed chemistry they speak of when they slap the Wangx!an one on it. God damn if I have to see this Cuckji shit from these shippers one more time my eyes will roll on the floor and melt from the stupid, which is ironic since Jiang Cheng himself was the canon Cuck who's bro got swept off his feet by the canon Chad. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Jiang Cheng through several passages in the book shows that his downfall was his jealousy of Wei Wuxian as his own person that did not listen to him specifically but it was never in terms of romance at the base of what MXTX was showing simple as that. This was shown with Wei Wuxian's interest in Lan Wangji, him saving Lan Wangji and to a point MianMian, as well as the Wen Remnants because it simply left Jiang Cheng what he considered more work and trouble. He cared about Wei Wuxian in so much as Wei Wuxian didn't make a splash for the reputation of Yunmeng Jiang while hypocritically having made use of Wei Wuxian during the war and turning around to be jealous of the devotion Wei Wuxian had during that time due to the attention Wei Wuxian garnered. Jiang Cheng simply did not think he had to extend some sort of actual good will to Wei Wuxian since he felt he had given enough of that just by the sake of Jiang Fengmian taking him in as a disciple and raising him. HOW you get Wei Wuxian having romantic inclination out of this, I can't say as I am not enlightened enough for the wonders of ChengX!an and apparently want to fuck MXTX who I have never met or know, or, want to fuck the very gay leads (who do not exist) despite being a lesbian.