#helpline6336

[vermillioncrown]

oMG I DID NOT REALISE that you published the lwh fic already! I was on backpacking trip in Europe, ans I’ve finally checked all my fic updates. I’m so excited! Using outsiders’ views instead for the story is ultimate genius writing - it adds so much depth, especially after all that we’ve been asking and discussing with you here on tumblr on lwh and her complexities👏🏼👏🏼

this is such an overdue answer lol

i hope you had fun! i have too many neuroses to handle the stress of backpacking places.

yeah, the outside pov keeps the story tighter, too. i got the idea from reading the naruto fic 'the scorpion and the frog', and marveled at how much ground was covered in the amount of writing that they did. and things with ocs and transmigrators can drag on for a while - hence why dbd is the way it is, but i wouldn't want my main project any other way

as a side story, i wanted larb to be more concise and easy to complete. also, i have to thank the people on my tumblr for asking fun asks and helping me flesh out the au.

ch 2 will be out later tonight (it's still tonight until i fall asleep ok), hope you enjoy it!

[vermillioncrown]

Oops I meant to submit this as a Ask instead, so ANYWAY:

Two ideas, and pls forgive me if it goes into another plane of possibility:

1. How about ZYX + the Prince? Only because it hints that the guy ZYX made fun of in the royal library for reading romance novels is actually the Prince. Wouldn’t it be hilarious for ZYX to suddenly appear as Queen in front of Gucci gang and WWX/LMJ going “lol you guys are fucked”, and turning the MDZS world upside down with her queenly rule? Also the Prince might be soft hearted, and ZYX helps to balance this out with their *chaos*.

I started on this ship and I can’t stop going forward.

2. How about Z!Cangse Sanren? That would be *amazing*, and what is CSR actually survives through mad inventions and lots of math?

1. hey. you. your peepers are sure working 👀👀👀👀👀

there's stuff in store for the imperial entanglements :)

but if zyx becomes empress/imperial consort (bc at this level, it's not just a queen), they would be choosing to no longer involve themselves with the cultivation realm. part of cultivation is the fact that you're defying the heavens by trying to ascend, and that's not just philosophy, it's fact. the more powerful you get, the more breakthroughs you attempt, the more the heavens will test you (violently). by trying to cultivate and establish power in the mundane realm, it's as if you're trying to challenge the heavens with the earth. not allowed. that's calling for heavenly calamities to hit the earth for that transgression.

you might be wondering "verm, then how can there be any imperial entanglements at all???"

well, grandpa zhu has an in, somehow. you'll see when you see.

[crown prince is currently UNAVAILABLE as an option. pre-requisites have not been met.]

2. z!cssr is rogue!zyx that wandered out of containment two decades earlier

(i have a feeling that og!cssr wasn't merely wild, she prob was teasing lqr to the point of bullying him)

(like, no matter how much you find a guy annoying, it's mean and highly disrespectful, borderline violent, to forcefully modify their body)

things haven't gone to full shit yet, might as well do something about it

find a way to assassinate wrh (bc what does z!cssr know about power vacuums and history of a sect??) whatever falls out, will fall out

(what if z!cssr's increasingly outlandish assassination attempts become the fun thing that keeps wrh from going off the megalomania deep end?)

(jianghu's weirdest friendship, take 6)

z!cssr spends a lot of time otherwise roaming around, seeing sights, helping people (like rogue!zyx, but with less of the 'oh god there is a problem and i'm pretending it doesn't exist'). so of course she'll have encounters with the big sects ("what's 'jurisdiction'? haha i'm barely literate") (she's literate enough)

spends a lot of time avoiding big sect heirs (besides her biannual 'murder wrh' event), but makes friends with the people in their periphery. or women that will someday be married to the heirs/leaders.

(no way to miscommunicate any jfm & cssr & yzy drama, z!cssr doesn't go out her way to interact w jfm and would rather meet w yzy if she had to meet someone of authority, idk what jfm's deal is so let's say he only has passing interest in "bssr's disciple" like many others but it fizzles out, yzy becomes reluctant friends w z!cssr when it becomes apparent that z!cssr might be slightly ignorant, but they're not a naïve idiot)

idk i think wei changze must have had something to have drawn in cssr in canon, he seems like a person that z!cssr can genuinely catch feelings for (zyx is typically demisexual, but feelings are never off the table. with how society tends to conflate sex = feelings, it's easier to forego both).

pregnancy is bweh gross, but biggest fear is dying via childbirth + loss of autonomy as a pregnant lady from doctors + other people's perceptions. as z!cssr and a powerful rogue cultivator, she can literally do the thing she wants - fuck off without no contact until she wants to come back, after all business has been concluded. biggest influence is a morbid curiosity/some sort of obligation to bring wwx into the world.

"oh you got married - you GOT MARRIED AND DIDN'T EVEN INVITE YOUR FRIENDS?!"

"WHERE DID THIS KID EVEN COME FROM?!?"

"... me?"

^yzy near throttling her friend for her whimsical ways.

oh, and as a wandering rogue, likely z!cssr would have made friends w mme lan a long time ago. spidey senses tingle when she thinks about a friend she hasn't checked in on for a while, and "no... nah, that would be too convenient. but maybe... but nah. nah?"

wcz sighs, packing up the family's bags and corralling little wwx "i'll get us checked out of the inn and grab supplies." he's too used to z!cssr's whims.

[vermillioncrown]

it breaks my heart that here be monsters is abandoned, so i'll pocket it for a rainy day

can't find the second rec on ao3, ffn, and google?

[vermillioncrown]

actually, I can't stop imagining what would it be like if zyx, xy and wwx start working on a project together? three brilliant cultivators/inventors who will definitely devolve into gremlins that never leave the lab and just keep experimenting until one of them keel over from exhaustion/lack of spiritual energy/deviation etc

i feel like it's too easy to see mad scientist/genius-type characters in media and think they're all "yes, ~projects~" with little raccoon hands gremlins. working in academia does not allow me to tolerate that trope, even for fun - prob like how actual coffee shop baristas can't deal with coffee shop au's lol

so let's break it down.

based on goal orientation motivation theory, wwx and xy are both mastery-approach type learners. their goal is to understand the topic at hand (approach) and are vested in self-improvement (mastery). willing to engage, willing to learn and experiment - they want to know and if others can help them along, perfect.

zyx is a mastery/performance-avoidance type learner, someone who wants to learn something to understand (mastery) but mostly to avoid misunderstanding a topic (avoidance), and to not be the dumbest one in the room (performance). alone, they are willing to indulge their curiosity. in a group, though, it's about survival of the fittest (even if there's no grading involved).

so likely, how it will play out is...

unfortunately, wwx has Expectations of zyx (in a nice way), and zyx will feel pressured to perform up to those expectations (in a bad way). if it was just these two, wwx will first lead the way by doing a thing and zyx will spitefully try to keep up, but eventually spite is tiring (esp in face of wwx's regard) and they'd be too engrossed in doing research together with wwx.

(the equivalence is when my bf caught me and our former landlord/labmate huddled together at 3am in the living room. we were whisper-arguing over some fluid dynamics derivation under the moonlight, he came out to get water, saw us turn to him like raccoons in the dark, and he nodded and quietly went back to our bedroom.)

add in xy, both wwx and xy can egg each other on to keep innovating and what not. zyx will hole up in their own little space and very defensively stay within their own topic of interest (hopefully one that doesn't overlap much with the other two), and fall into the habit of prodding them to discuss their research rather than what zyx is doing. wwx and xy would have to remove themselves from research tunnel vision to realize the mind trick that zyx is playing on them if they want zyx's active participation.

(people who are too go-getter are kinda tiring. i need time to gather my thoughts and let them marinate. so when there are no immediate stakes, it's me letting two people argue, and occasionally throwing out a statement to keep them focused on each other while i quietly make my braincells connect in panic.)

now, with zyx and xy duo... 😶

[vermillioncrown]

Whenever I read Jiang Cheng’s dialogue or inner monologue, I always see and hear Ronny Chieng (is it just me?!)

ahaha esp his bit with helping his mom with technology and he just gets more and more frustrated "DON'T BOOK MY FLIGHT, I'LL BOOK IT MYSELF YOU'LL MESS IT UP"

the exasperated anger, there's always a hint of impatience, I Understand