#jade mxtx post

[fridaywormteeth]

”lwj wore mourning white for 13 years ” babe shut up shut up he’d have worn it regardless it’s literally his sect color those are literally just his robes

[lotuslitearchives]

Just posted my first fanfic!!

If you are interesting in Drunk Twin Jades of Gusu messing up Jin Zixun's life, this will be the place for you.

Rated: Gen

Chapter: 1/?

Summary:

Instead of proclaiming for a toast with the Lans at the banquet, Jin Zixun discreetly tampers with their tea just to knock them down a peg. After all, why not liven up the place. Unfortunately he was not aware of what happens when you get Lans drunk, fortunately Wei Wuxian is there to handle the not-so impervious jades.

A/N: A sort-of crack fic that I started writing after getting some energy during a discord call with my friend. This is indeed my first ever fic so constructive criticism is very much appreciated and welcomed. I just wrote something I think I would enjoy so I hope you guys enjoy!

[mxtxfanatic]

I find it interesting that in both svsss and mdzs, mxtx writes in what I affectionately refer to as “knock-offs” of at least one of the main pairing. What are knock-offs? Characters that are said to be incredibly similar to a protagonist, but with some slight difference to make a commentary of some kind.

In svsss, Gonyi Xiao and Zhuzhi-lang serve as Luo Binghe knock-offs and are shown to be admired by Shen Qongqiu during the period in time where Shen Qingqiu’s relationship with Luo Binghe is still heavily adversial. The fact that Shen Qingqiu holds affection for characters that look and act like Luo Binghe but are just not him is meant to show how Shen Qingqiu’s problems with Luo Binghe are not anything to do with Luo Binghe but with the novel-assigned roles that he believes they are fated to play out. The fact that he eventually gets with Luo Binghe but never once considers his knock-offs as viable romantic partners is meant to show that he sees Luo Binghe. Luo Binghe is a person to him, not a character archetype or a eye candy for female readers (and characters) or a product of the story. Luo Binghe is a whole individual unique enough to be fallen in love with on his own merit.

In mdzs, Lan Xichen is Lan Wangji’s knock-off. I really feel like this one is obvious because the whole “twin jades” thing (😂) but for the sake of being clear: Lan Xichen and Lan Wangji are said to physically identical but different in personality. Lan Xichen is the smiling “twin,” while Lan Wangji is the stoic and expressionless one. Lan Xichen cares about niceties and making friends, Lan Wangji cares about rules and shirks companionship. However, not only is it easy for Wei Wuxian to tell them apart, he—life of the party anywhere he goes—picks the killjoy twin over his much more outwardly friendly counterpart. Why is this important? 1) It shows us that appearances don’t reveal to us the full character of a person: Lan Xichen, “the nice one,” is the one who supports the corruption of the cultivation world and is implicated in multiple acts of injustice in the name of maintaining the status quo and not breaking etiquette, while Lan Wangji, “the rule follower,” commits several social taboos and breaks many rules of his own clan in order to stand up for what was morally right. 2) Wei Wuxian is not enamored with or fooled by appearances: whatever attraction and interest Wei Wuxian displays (overtly, obnoxiously) about Lan Wangji is completely absent from him towards Lan Xichen. To him, Lan Wangji is Lan Zhan, Lan-er-gege, Hanguang-jun, whereas Lan Xichen, for all intents and purposes, is just Lan Wangji’s brother lmao. There’s nothing about Lan Xichen that stands out to hold Wei Wuxian’s attention the way Lan Wangji does. And when you dive into how both brothers lived their lives throughout the text, it becomes clear why. Twins they may appear, but their moral convictions set them very far apart from each other.

Now to get to the question that sparked this post: are there any knock-off characters for Hia Cheng or Xie Lian in tgcf?

[pumpkinpaix]

Chapter Spotlight 4:

"Iterative Violence: English (mis?)Translations of Modao Zushi and Chen Qing Ling" by Chant Y. Ng

Describe your topic/chapter in one sentence/one meme/140 characters.

A work by any other translation would NOT smell as sweet!!! In fact!!!!

What drew you to this topic?

Hi yes it's me, your pal cyan, you may know me from such hit posts as 8k words of rage-crying about the translation of 知己 as soulmates (which is about translation as violence), or maybe that other one about translation as violence (shockingly, it's really about translation as violence), or perhaps even that other other one about how one might translate Lan Xichen's title— (you know, I think this one is also about translation as violence)

If there’s one thing you hope the fandom takes away from your article, what would it be?

I hope that people think harder about how impossible it is to translate a text, and that they choose to extend more grace and compassion to authors and translators alike. A translation is not a window but a painting. Also, I'm manifesting better pay and respect for the work of translation into the cosmos. Please consider this a memo I am posting on the great message board of the universe. Thank you.

What is your MDZS/CQL origin story? (i.e. how did you come to this text?)

Started watching, made some gifs, read the book. Had a breakdown. Bon appetit.

Favorite adaptation, if any?

Audio drama! The love, care and effort put into it continues to astound me. Sometimes, to get the sound of a dizi hitting the ground, you gotta throw a dizi on the ground, y'know?

If you were isekai-ed into MDZS/CQL, what sect affiliation would you choose and why?

Please let me live my life in peace, I am but a feeble scholar.

Most compelling relationship in the text?

Twin Jades!!!!

Chaotic one-sentence pitch to get your friends into MDZS/CQL?

*gripping you tightly by the shoulders* don't

If you could ask MXTX one question, what would it be?

你最近怎么样啊？

Anything to say to potential readers of the collection?

Thanks for checking us out! It's been a wild and unpredictable (four-year!!) ride but everyone worked very hard on their parts. Means a lot even if you're just here for our little promo. :) If you'd like a copy of my contribution for classroom use, please do reach out!

You can find Chant (cyan) here on Tumblr @pumpkinpaix.

(FAQ) (all posts on Catching Chen Qing Ling)

[lancabbage]

In light of some things being posted on here. I think we should all remember that people can be very influenced and jaded by their love for a character when it comes to the translation of a novel or text.

I've seen a few recently that have very carefully added things to the text by translating it with their own interpretation of the scene and implying a certain closeness between two characters that simply isn't there.

As I referenced recently, MXTX literally stated in her original author's notes that JC did not have any romantic feelings towards WWX and WWX only had eyes for LWJ. Yet people still say there are connotations of "childhood sweethearts" in the original Chinese text. There is not, you are misinterpreting this as something it is not and even MXTX said as such. She would not have added this to her author notes if she wanted to imply such a thing, it's that simple.

[incorrect-web-novels]

Webnovel Carrd Links [Part 1]

I usually use Novel Updates, but Carrds are great to support the author, find translations not on NU, find Content Warnings, and learn more about the story / other adaptations. If there's a novel not here, it can be helpful to search the name of the novel + "carrd" or "novel updates"

Library Carrds / Carrds with Multiple Novels

Completed Baihe Carrd (click the sunglasses)

Baihe Novels Carrd 

Baihe Support 

Novel Carrd Library (Danmei & Baihe)

Aelia’s Library (Modern & Historical Danmei)

Unlimited Flow Danmei Carrd 

Danmei Recommendations List

Underrated Danmei 

Modern Danmei 

Twitter Thread with Danmei Carrds 

Author Carrds

(These authors have more works - I just listed the most popular ones/the ones I knew)

Cang Wu Bin Bai - author of Golden Stage and Fight the Landlord, Fall in Love

Cyan Wings - author of Devil Venerable Also Wants to Know, High Energy QR Code, They All Say I’ve Met a Ghost, etc.

Feitian Yexiang - author of Dinghai Fusheng Records & To Rule in a Turbulent World

Huai Shang - author of the Sword Named No Way Out

Jiang Zi Bei - author of PUBG: Online Romance of the Century, I Can Do It, and I’ve Liked Your Boyfriend for a Long Time

Liu Bing Jie - author of The Wife is First, Peach, and The White Cat’s Divine Scratching Post

Man Man He Qi Duo - author of Those Years In Quest of Honour Mine 

Meatbun Doesn’t Eat Meat - author of The Husky and His White Cat Shizun

Meng Xi Shi - author of Estranged, Peerless, Thousand Autumns, The Fourteenth Year of Chenghua, etc.

Mo Chen Huan - author of The Earth is Online and the Villain Has Something to Say

Mu Su Li - author of Panguan and Copper Coins

MXTX / Mo Xiang Tong Xiu - author of MDZS, TGCF, and SVSSS

Please Don’t Laugh novels - author of FGEP, Ruzhui, and JQWS

Priest - author of Guardian, LHJC, Can Ci Pin, Mo Du, Gumen, Liu Yao, etc.

Shui Qian Cheng - author of Wu Chang Jie 

Tang Jiuqing / t97 - author of Qiang Jin Jiu & Nan Chan

Wu Zhe - author of Unbridled, Sa Ye, Antidote, etc. 

Zhichu - author of Fanservice Paradox

Danmei / BL

2ha / the Husky and His White Cat Shizun (1, 2)

Bat / Bianfu 

Can Ci Pin

Carven Jade / Zhuo Yu 

Cold Sands

Copper Coins 

Devil Venerable Also Wants to Know

Dinghai Fusheng Records

Di Wang Gong Lue / The Emperor’s Strategy 

Don’t You Like Me? 

Encountering a Snake 

Everyone Thinks That I Like Him

Fake Slackers

Fanservice Paradox 

Fight the Landlord, Fall in Love

Fox Demon Cultivation Manual / FDCM 

Global University Entrance Examination / QQGK / Global Examination 

Golden Stage 

Green Plum Island 

Guardian 

Guomen 

How to Survive as a Villain 

Jun You Ji Fou / How is the Gentleman Feeling? 

Lie Huo Jiao Chou / LHJC 

Little Mushroom 

Liu Yao (press the 3 circles) 

MDZS / the Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation (1, 2, 3)

Mist (CW: glitch effect, flashing lights)

Mistakenly Saving the Villain / MISVIL

Mo Du / Silent Reading 

My Junior Still Hasn’t Killed Me

Nan Chan 

[Part 2]

[rourouxiaobao]

WIPS & Planned Projects

Too many fics, too little writing time and Brain RAM, essentially. So I just wanna organise my thoughts and fic folders. ^^;;;

FIC/SERIES STATUS (As of 2024)

ACTIVE WIPS

Embers of the Summer Sky [DOE fic, 2 chapters to completion, Qixi extra planned]

The Legend of the Black Snake & Jade Rabbit [MDZS series, smutfic sequel in progress]

Parenthetical [MDZS fic, last chapter in progress]

Like Shooting Stars Across The Night [DOE Mafia AU series, fic #2 in progress]

Shattered Pieces Will Remain [MDZS What If WWX Was Like Mdm Lan AU series, next part (multi-chapter fic) in progress]

Mated To A Dragon [DarkJi Mafia AU series, 15k appreciation fic in progress]

The Power of Soup Compels You [MDZS WZL/JYL fic, next chapter in progress]

ACTIVE UNPOSTED FICS

MXTX FoodZine 2024 [SVSSS Moshang & Bingqiu, MDZS Yi City fam, TGCF Hualian projects]

Beauty In A Cup Of Wine [MDZS WRH/LQR 5+1]

The Wisterias Bloom In Spring [MDZS CSSR/YZY fic]

The Heart of a Golden Lotus [MDZS JC is WZL's son fic]

Jade Feathers of the Spring Heron [MDZS LXC/MXY fic]

The Memory of Water [SVSSS Bingjiu fic]

Dreamwalk [SVSSS Bingqiu fic, set during SQQ's 5yr death]

Perchance To Dream [SVSSS Bingjiu fic]

The Summoning [SVSSS Bingjiu fic, SVSSS kid!Jiu accidentally summons PIDW!Bingge]

Greed (a.k.a. Flowers Fall And Seasons Rise) [TGCF Beefleaf post-canon reincarnation 5+1 fic]

White Wings Amidst Chaos [MDZS x TGCF crossover fic]

ON HIATUS (NOT ABANDONED)

The Adventures of Lan Boya [DOE x MDZS crossover series]

The Price of Brotherhood [MDZS DarkJi series]

The FoxSang Agenda [MDZS Fox!NHS series]

In The Lotus Pond [MDZS YMJ merfic]

The Fox King's Bride [DOE foxbride!Boya fic]

Shadow of the Midnight Sun [DOE fic]

The Falling [DOE foxslave!QM fic]

Pulled Into Your Gravity [DOE accidental sugarbaby!HSY series]

The Mafia Revenge DD AU [DOE Mafia DD AU series]

Spiritual Weapons Have Feelings Too [MDZS spiritual weapon series]

Silver Mirror [DOE vampire!FY futurefic]

[liberty-or-death]

Hua Cheng’s Poem (Part 1) - “The Song of Mourning: Fourth Segment”

(I planned to post this initially in Jan 2023 but I realise i have to post this soon or I can't finish the next few parts LOL. And it's part the poetry club discord homework so here it goes!)

In TGCF, Hua Cheng says he loves the poem “离思 Mourning” and it has been referred to several times in the novel. There was even a scene that went like this: 🥰

“Who knew that Hua Cheng wasn’t done hugging him and violently pushed him onto the jade table, scattering the brush, ink, paper and ink stone onto the ground. Xie Lian’s hand brushed over the plate of vermillion sand, leaving a few traces of crimson on the paper in the struggle. On the paper, the words “Wushan” on the phrase “If you’ve been enchanted by the wind and cloud of Wushan, you won’t be attracted to the clouds of other scenery” were stained with small red marks, almost flirtatiously so. Xielian uttered, “San…”

Before he could finish his sentence, Hua Cheng pressed his shoulders down and kissed him.” - Translated by me. Chapter 127

This poem is the fourth segment of the “The Five Songs of Mourning 离思五首” (aka known as Mourning 离思) written by the poet Yuan Zhen 元稹. Mourning was a common theme in ancient Han Poetry. This poem describes the love for his wife, and his how much he misses them when she passed on.

For the record, the whole poem was in the novel.

曾经沧海难为水，

If you’ve experienced the rippling sea, you won’t be attracted to water anywhere else

(This is a line now used in modern times to describe the intense love one has for their lover)

除却巫山不是云。

If you’ve been enchanted by the wind and cloud of Wushan (Mount Wu), you won’t be attracted to the clouds of other scenery

取次花丛懒回顾，

Even amidst all the flowers, I’m lazy to take another look. (The “flowers” refer to the prostitutes or women)

半缘修道半缘君。

This is because, half of it the reason is due to a Tao cultivator’s pure mind, and the half is because of the you that I once had.

Analysis

The first two lines are about how the poet is in love with his partner. The third line is about how he is no longer affected by the prostitute he sees. The fourth line means that he’s not interested anymore because firstly, he’s not interested in matters of the world anymore as he’s cultivating the Tao and secondly, he’s not interested in other women as his beloved has passed on.

🦄 My Analysis - TGCF

The third line caught my eye when I read this poem. I personally thought it could be interpreted literally that the writer wasn’t interested in women in general in the TGCF context. (Idk if that’s why MXTX picked this poem? Lol )

And hmm “walking among the flowers” seemed particularly fitting as Hua Cheng 花城‘s name literally means “a city of flowers.”

And Wushan 巫山!! I love that little point where Wushan was smeared with red. Wushan’s an allusion to a couple’s rendezvous in chinese poetry. And lol so that imagery of the words Wushan “stained with small red marks, almost flirtatiously so.” HELP

Okay, this will be a three part meta. I promise you it'll be interesting.

Additional Links

身在无间, 心在桃源” (Body in Avīci (अवीचि), Body in Taoyuan) 

Xielian’s Sword - 芳心 (Fangxin) / 诛心 (Zhuxin)

Alternate analysis - @fwoopersongs has done a brilliant job!

[thricedead]

are u into svsss bcoz i've been meaning to ask someone who knows: what the fuck goes on in there question mark

I would not say I'm into it because it rests extremely low on my danmei rankings list, but I did read it (and own the oficial english TLs)...

Brief plot summary: Shen Yuan, a fan of male power fantasy xianxia webnovels reads a novel that it so intensely bad and insufferable it causes him to suffer a stroke (?) and die on the spot. He ends up isekaid into that very webnovel, reborn in the body of the protagonist's extremely bad tempered and violent shifu, Shen Qingqiu. At that point, the protagonist Luo Binghe is still a somewhat scatterbrained and puppy-eyed young teenager, but Shen Yuan/Qingqiu is aware that Luo Binghe will later end up a hardened and ruthless man who rises to power as emperor, kills his abuser (IN THIS CASE SHEN YUAN HIMSELF) and goes on to rape thousands of women and kill thousands of men. With the help of an inexplicable deus ex machina system of instructions, Shen Yuan realizes that he has to change the plot of the novel and raise Luo Binghe into a kinder man to evade his own death. He starts treating Luo Binghe with some basic human decency and gentleness, but this causes the boy to fall obsessively in love with him. Luo Binghe turning gay fucks up the novel hierarchy and throws the story off course, the characters exit stasis and the story begins evolving changed by Luo Binghe's ardent affection, and Shen Qingqiu's reluctant reciprocation once they reunite after Luo Binghe grows up. The plot itself and the background characters failed to be really original and intriguing compared to MXTX's following two works, so I'll skip through the majority of it unless you or anyone is REALLY interested in order to address the truly unsavory romance that really sullies my very beloved concept of "metafictional awareness alters the course of the story" that I wrote abt both academically and privately. Binghe/Qingqiu is a really grating relationship even for a reader like me who can stomach a lot in terms of unsavory BL, since Binghe has an extreme teacher/student kink and that sort of play (which I find mortifying as a victim of teacher SA I'll be real) extends thruout their encounters and well into their marriage, but I also hesitate to blame the older Qingqiu for this dynamic because he is more or less just constantly being assaulted and harassed and having sex acts he doesn't enjoy performed on him. Book 4, or the collection of extra side stories, is pretty much just Binghe assaulting Qingqiu in 1000 ways and it's supposed to be cute because Qingqiu doesn't hate it as much as before LOL. I would have been sick to my stomach reading it if MXTX's quality of writing at the time were not really poor and flowery in a way that reads as hilarious, one can only read about Binghe's meteorite-hard pillar of jade finding a hidden jewel within Qingqiu's hidden cavern so many times before becoming desentisized and just liveblogging it on tumblr for 3 likes.

Despite it all I don't regret giving this pillar of western danmei enjoyment a read because it offers a solid BG for critical analysis of MDZS and TGCF, novels which I enjoyed as leisurely reading significyntly more. "SVSSS is a parody" was uttered in its defense too many times to count, but I fail to see how that statement holds water considering it was (at least in western danmei circles) taken very nearly completely at face value, and considering that equally absurd and discomforting sexual power dynamics are very present in MDZS and TGCF. Looking at MXTX's entire opus its kind of insane how much of her pussy she put into putting that Enstars post thats like "if the younger person manipulates and abuses the older person in the couple, is it still a problematic age gap?" Into practical action LOL bizarre woman

[lansplaining]

*rocks up to the fandom meme mad late with drip coffee i made in my own home even though its like 10pm*

sometimes i see posts that express some intense general feeling about my dude, lan wangji. intense like or dislike, extreme affection or disdain, you know, the usual. and – with the exception of people who are super blatant side character fans who are expressing the opinion they adopted from their fav side character – i don’t really believe any of these strong emotion claims (ppl who are actively roleplaying jiang cheng or lan jingyi i believe you i promise pls).

(beginning hyperbolic generalizations in 3,2,1-) as a group fandom just does not ponder lan wangji enough for me to believe many of them actually care the way the suggest they do, and when they do he doesn’t stay the topic of conversation for long. sure, they might start a post about his traumas and woes about his parents and his beloved but strict grumpy uncle but that post will swiftly slide to xichen and the way he approaches relationships and then it turns into 3zun and that turns into Mess lol. maybe they’ll start with how he was raised but don’t be fooled! that is actually just the opportunity to complain about the evil lan sect and all its controlling rules in a trench coat. if you find a post about his relationship with his brother then what you’ve actually found is a post about the tension between the nie bros, the trauma amongst the siblings jin, or Whatever Is Happening In Lotus Pier and the Twin Jades of Lan are actually just there as a comparison point in paragraph three of the essay. more often than any of this, if you think a post is about lan zhan, blink, and it will be wangxian before you hit the author’s note/tags.

secondly, if the fic isn’t a lwj-centric fic then lwj tends to be 1) an objective window into the story, a reliable narrator you can trust to give you the plot with no opinions, thoughts, or feelings about what’s happening 2) a Voice of Judgement an author can use to berate a character they’re mad at with the idea that hanguang-jun can get away with that with minimal fall out and is Convincingly Convicting enough to change the character’s behavior 3) a plot-hole filler – you don’t have to explain why something is true is lwj says it bc he never lies and he probably knows more than you. it’s the maple leaf in the Xuanwu cave over and over 4) a treat for wwx. you don’t have to like lwj or let him speak, just have him in the background for wwx to kiss and beg money from occasionally.

i have to say I’m not /bothered/ by this. i have enough lwj brainrot for all of us I don’t need other people’s thoughts and headcanons i have my own and a corner of fandom that supports me in these things. i know a lot of it is bc mxtx made him all ~mysterious. i just think its funny when people speak so strongly on the guy as if they think of him ever for real at all.

this is fascinating. obviously I spend my times in the JGY/xiyao corners of the fandom, but I am probably one of the people you are talking about in some ways!! i fucking love lan wangji, i experience extreme Feelings about him regularly and he's the reason i fell in love with CQL and ended up on this downward spiral into madness

but if i tried to make a post about him it would be like, 'u know when CQL wangji says 'are there rules already written for everything in the world?' and it permanently altered my brain chemistry? (hand gestures)'. my position on lan wangji is no thoughts, only internal yelling.

however, i think all the patterns you're noticing are so right, especially when it comes to fic. when it comes to meta i sort of get it-- wangji doesn't feel like he NEEDS explanations, he's the main love interest! other characters need their arcs and interests and personalities excavated, whereas his is surely just right out there. but it isn't!

[vxmp-irate]

intro post to vxmp-irate’s blog !!

my name is aster :3

18, bigender + queer, he/she pronouns

i like to post fanart and oc art, also i love to write so occasionally i’ll post something that has to do with my writing

i use procreate for my art, and i often use mellon_soup as a reference for poses, but all art is my own

socials -

instagram: vxmpirate (art)

tiktok: vxmpirate (edits and art)

twt: wingedlyres (random - sometimes art)

pinterest: astirial (some art and boards)

ao3: vxmpirate (a few fics)

fandoms i’m in

VLD

gravity falls

hermitcraft/life series

OFMD

deltarune/undertale

the hunger games

a bunch of random animanga

also mxtx

if you’re in these fandoms pls interact !

about my characters…

i have a handful of ocs, and i love them all so dearly so here’s a bit about them:

z - he/him pronouns, bisexual, my persona, and a huge asshole but he’s the oc i draw the most so i love him heart, always bleeding out of his mouth cuz hes dumb and gets in fights, also self proclaimed midwestern emo

axel - z’s boyfriend, he/they pronouns, gay, huge space nerd and obsessed with the past (he strictly listens to pre-2010 music)

phoebe - she/they pronouns, bisexual, blonde, also kinda a persona (but in a “omg shes so me” way, not in a “i designed her to be me” way), she’s super into early 2000s culture, a bit of a y2k baddie

vix - they/she/he pronouns, lesbian, phoebe’s dumbass girlfriend, punk and goth, he is a musician!

jesse - they/he pronouns, unlabeled icon, designed them as a character for a school assignment and ran with it, they cover their fucked-upness with humor, originally designed as a phoenix shapeshifter, but the idea was scrapped

juniper - he/she pronouns, also unlabeled lol, jesse’s partner, my final of the persona ocs, i use juniper whenever i am making a self insert oc for something, and she started off as a kitsune shapeshifter (idea was scrapped)

and lastly, i have a story about characters who are given special powers through their birthstones. i’ve had the story for a while, but the characters are really really important to me and my art, so i draw them a lot. here’s just a small description of all of them:

noé, garnet, they/them

zoey, amethyst, she/they

jade, aquamarine, she/her

damien, diamond, he/him

emery, emerald, they/them

garret, pearl, he/they

lucy, ruby, she/he

liam, peridot, he/him

erik, sapphire, he/him

ophelia, opal, he/she/they

cecile, citrine, she/her

sophia, topaz, she/her

- i tend to refer to them as the names of their birthstones (ex. i call lucy ‘ruby’ way more than i call her lucy) but their birth names are all still used in the canon story i have set for them

closing thoughts

if you like my art, and are interested in any of the fandoms im in, or in any of my characters, feel free to follow me ^_^ i’ll be posting way more than i have in the past (which is.. never) and i’m so excited to be sharing my art with all of you

i do art as a hobby, but it really really helps me express my thoughts and joys and its a great way for me to share my interests, so i’m really looking forward to this blog

ok bye!

[lryghe]

MDZS thoughts; lan wangji

The longer I spend in the MDZS fandom, the more I realise how much I like Lan Wangji’s character in forms of adaptations (despite my general avoidance of anything that isn’t the novel). At first, Lan Wangji is introduced as just some uptight loser, but the more the story progresses, the more you realise he’s YOUR uptight loser and you like that about him. I wanted to talk about a few of my favourite things about him because he’s so so so complex, something that MXTX unfortunately forgot to give her later love interests (not a jab, just an observation of someone who mourns a Hua Cheng backstory every day). This post will contain spoilers from all adaptations of MDZS and this thought process comes as an apology of sorts to Lan Wangji after I flamed him in my last post. 

on silence;

I’ve talked about this extensively in my ‘MDZS thoughts; silence in MDZS’ post a while back, but Wangji’s use of silence is so important. Because there’s different types of silence, born out of different reasons, and Lan Wangji employs the most basic form of it for the most part. He’s quite literally silent majority of the time, and it’s so interesting to think about because it's like. He clearly has thoughts and feelings and personal motivations past what people expect of him, but never voices them. He’s seemingly content with his silence, knowing that there ARE people who understand him, even if it’s like 3 people. And people must expect so much of Lan Wangji, the ‘bearer of light’ Hanguang-jun, the second jade of Lan, brother of the Lan Sect Leader, the perfect man. Yet he never speaks out about these expectations, a surprisingly mature response for some guy who’s a teenager for most of this. Younger Lan Wangji is surrounded by people and yet is silent throughout his time in Cloud Recesses and in the aftermath of the Wen invasion. And I think this particular silence is borne of him knowing that no one will really listen to him, because they all have these grandiose ideas of who he is and how he’ll react, so he sticks to his lines (ha, or lack thereof) and continues onwards. Once we hit the time skip, Wangji very clearly gives off a different vibe, despite not being any chattier than he was before. This one is a confident, more isolated silence, having been worn down by a decade of grief and death, Lan Wangji is now silently assured in himself and his place in the world. 

on grief; 

On the topic of grief, the way Lan Wangji’s grief is portrayed is something that I see a lot of newer fans (I say this as a fan of 4-5 years now, I am no amateur) have not exactly a wrong idea about, but more of an uneducated view on? Because it's always, “I love the MXTX protagonists and how they wait for 5/ 13/ 800 years”, but MDZS is something entirely different from SVSSS and TGCF. Hua Cheng actually waits for 800 years with endless devotion and patience, Luo Binghe’s ‘wait’ is driven by delusions and a demon sword driving him crazy, but Lan Wangji is inherently different from them both. Because Lan Wangji doesn’t wait for Wei Wuxian, he’s actively mourning him. 13 years of playing inquiry was because he believed him to be dead, and just wanted to have a second to speak to his spirit. Going wherever there was chaos wasn’t to find Wei Wuxian himself, but to find situations which reminded him of him, even if it was just a second of something happening that would make him feel closer to the boy he fell in love with. Lan Wangji was never waiting for Wei Wuxian to come back, because he’s surprisingly mature about everything and knew that he was gone when he found nothing at the burial mounds. And it’s slightly upsetting when people ignore his mourning in favour of some type of optimism that he doesn’t have any more that Wei Wuxian would come back, because that’s doing such a disservice to him and his character. 

on isolation; 

Something that relates back to the concept of silence is Lan Wangji’s continued isolation throughout the novel. Because he’s introduced as like this pillar of righteousness (which he genuinely is, he’s an actually good guy), and this image is only furthered the more he continues on with life. He’s always emitting an aura of “ice and frost” towards everyone, and people have been placing him on a pedestal since he was 14, “every word and action of his set as examples of excellence”. And this must be such an isolating experience, you being at your formative years and you are still so alone, mostly out of your own actions, but also because no one wants to make an effort to know you past that exterior. And it is an exterior, because Wei Wuxian notes rather early on that Lan Wangji can simply just “become” the indifferent Hanguang-jun, this (mostly) self-imposed mask being what drives a wedge between Lan Wangji and just about everyone, notable outliers being Wei Wuxian and that’s it. I did a lot of rereading the introduction of the novel to find the quotes I used, because I really wanted to emphasise this point of his character, because it's so damn interesting! He’s so complex and the three points I’ve defined and explored are only at the surface level of what I could have rambled on about. But I’m nice and have toned it down. 

This post turned into a love letter to Lan Wangji and I’m not sorry at all. If there’s any mistakes, feel free to call me out (but nicely because I’m very sensitive).  

Words: 964 

Reading time: 3 mins 

[mollymauk-teafleak]

You have headcanon babies?! Can you tell us a little about them?

Oh I will drop everything and talk about these babies, don't you worry! Thankfully I'm wading through this hyper fixation with @minky-for-short who is organised enough to have made a Google Doc of all our mxtx series babies!

So for hualian, they have the most kids. They have two sons, Xuesong and Jinhai. But between those two, they also adopt a little ghost girl whose being offered up as collateral on a bet in the Ghost City casino, to Hua Cheng's disgust. He punishes the trafficker who offered her up and calls for his gege to help look after her until they can figure out what to do with her. Of course the answer is looking after her themselves and they name her Bao. She's actually the one who ends up succeeding her daddy as the Ghost King. Her older brother Xuesong becomes a cultivator himself and Jinhai becomes an artist as a much chiller way to follow in his daddy's footprints.

For wangxian, of course they come with Lan Yuan in canon who I adore. And I head canon a pair of twins for them in a post canon world, their own set of Twin Jades. I'm bad at names so I don't actually have any for them, suggestions welcome, but one boy who very much follows his baba's example and becomes a model cultivator and one girl who is so like her daddy, a chaotic demonic cultivator whose always getting into trouble.

And for bingqiu! A little girl named Li Jing with a cloud of curly hair and a fearsome attitude that really only her daddy Shen Quingqiu can control. Her baba is utterly useless when she turns her puppy dog eyes on him, he'd give her whatever she asked for in a heartbeat. Shen Quinqiu spends his life managing his husband and his daughter like they're on two of those toddler leashes

So yeah! They might change a little based on AU but for a canon setting or our general modern au thats how it goes!!

[jadedadultritsu]

o.O ????????

Pretty accurate though I’ve always been the underrated Buttercup :’)💚💔😂

[trickstersmagic]

I feel like I could play a drinking game with how much wei wuxian describes a man as “handsome”

[thesilversun]

This is why there’s not been anything much in the way of fic from me for the last 6 months. I’ve been writing this fic for the mxtx big bang 

Chapters: 21/21. (Complete) 

Fandom: 魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù 

Rating: Mature 

Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings (see A/N for applicable warnings)

Relationships: Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī/Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn, Jiāng Chéng | Jiāng Wǎnyín & Lán Huàn | Lán Xīchén Characters: Jiāng Chéng | Jiāng Wǎnyín, Lán Huàn | Lán Xīchén, Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī, Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn 

Additional Tags: Post canon, Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Past Lán Huàn | Lán Xīchén/Mèng Yáo | Jīn Guāngyáo, Panic Attacks, Poisoning, Stabbing, Nightmares, Revenge, Grief/Mourning, Hurt Jiāng Chéng | Jiāng Wǎnyín, Hurt Lán Huàn | Lán Xīchén, suicide of non canon character as part of plot, Suicidal Thoughts, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Torture, Blood and Injury, life changing injury/illness, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Friendship, Pre-XiCheng, Additional Warnings In Author’s Note, Hopeful Ending, Alcohol, difficulty eating properly due to having been poisoned

Summary:

Post seclusion, Lan Xichen continues to struggle with grief and guilt over Jin Guangyao’s actions and how much blame should be attached to himself. He has become more adept at hiding the extent of it, of living everyday with what feels like a crushing weight on his chest. 

The four years following the revelation about his golden core and the events at the Guanyin Temple have been awful. Jiang Cheng’s reputation as short tempered and unreasonably angry have intensified, to the point that many seem to think that qi deviation is something that probably lies in his not too distant future. A poisoning at a discussion conference finally brings things to a head, forcing them both to confront parts of their thoughts and lives that they have tried to avoid.

Please take note of warning in tags and in the authors note at the start of the story.