#specifically wrt the wens

[sparring-spirals]

I got to say I really liked the episode (despite only having watched exu calamity of the exu series) and I think maybe Matt needed a breather after so many fast paced, lore filled episodes.

however, I am kinda bummed that the fcg processing has been put on hold for (at least) two weeks now and that means that, despite them being great actors that truly merge with their characters at the table, their reactions will be much less raw and there’s a chance some of them will forget tidbits of information, emotions they felt when it happened because they (as role players) will have had time to process it out of the game and it might create a dissonance in the game. tbf I kind of felt the difference even between the end of ep 91 and the beginning of 92 but it made sense because technically they were still running and couldn’t afford to process. idk. I have hope that we’ll still see that raw emotion, but I fear it won’t be as impactful as it could’ve been, especially if they’ll have to put the “reporting for duty” hat on immediately when they get to the camp

I think being a little bummed about the sort of unexpected hiatus on the Bell's Hells/Post F.C.G processing is super understandable! As someone who also really did enjoy the Crownskeepers return (hello im still yelling about Opal internally), I'm kind of in the same camp of being kind of thrown/disappointed about not getting to really dig into/sit with the Bell's Hells post-F.C.G loss. Like, LOVED the Crownkeepers, fascinating second half, kind of meh on the specific timing.

I'm holding my reservations about whether they're going to have to keep running/moving once we return to their portion of the story, since hey, until it happens (or doesn't!), we don't know, so I don't feel like getting too in my head about it until then.

That said! I do think that in general the cast puts characterization and staying true to the emotions of the character/story as a very high priority within the campaign. I think you're right that it won't be the exact same as if they had done a big emotional blowup/goodbye/processing scene in the same ep where they lost F.C.G, or immediately after. I don't think that means it has to be less impactful, just that- yeah, they'll have had more time to actually think/process it.

But they're also all professional voice actors who have, IMO, thus far shown how much they think about the inner lives of their characters and enjoy really digging deep into the emotional/interpersonal aspects of roleplay.

My assumption (my hope?) is that with additional time to think about + process a devastating/deeply emotional loss for their character(s), they'd choose to lean into that more, and not less. It wont be the same as the immediate raw reactions, thats true! But i dont think that means it has to be less impactful, even if they (as people) have had more time to process, and will be choosing how their characters, fresh off the loss, react. I dont think thats a guarantee it will be less impactful/emotional (maybe the additional thinking would actually enhance the reactions being true/insightful to the characters vs gut reactions from cast), but it will be different.

But if the cast chooses to lean into the heartbreak/emotions, and the circumstances of the BH in the upcoming ep enable it, I'm sure they can still kick my ass (emotionally), timeskip or not.

In general, I'm cautiously optimistic about what could happen next! Even if I don't love the timing thus far. I think there's still plenty of ways for me to get what I'm hoping for wrt F.C.G/BH. :] There are plenty of ways for me to get let down too, probably, but until it happens, or doesn't, I'm opting to not get too doomery about it. We'll see.

I uh. Hope that helps? A bit? Being bummed about specific things you were hoping for being off the table is totally reasonable. just hoping to lend an alternate way of viewing it, if desired.

(i wrote the sentence: "don't be lamenting your chickens before they hatch" and then went "what the fuck" out loud. i spent 4 hours at work today just doing systems diagramming and my brain is fried. clearly. keeping this here for my own entertainment.)

[llycaons]

oh my god cor this is the fucking post I was talking abt in my tags. I found it Months ago and I haven't stopped thinking about it since. it was like 3 o'clock in the morning and it made me so angry that I couldn't fall asleep. it fills me w such an unquenchable bloodlust for op that I can't even explain all of the (extensive) reasons why they're wrong. straight to the guillotine

HI BEN THANKS FOR THIS AS I LOVE HATING RIGHT FROM THE SOURCE!!!! to be entirely fair I think class analyses of mdzs can be a little more structured and elaborate than what was intended or what was put into the original work (or any adaptation) but. well. it's not like he underwent periods of homelessness and starvation due to poverty to come out of them a huge fan of the cultivation world or of the political actors who move to consolidate power at the expense of others. in the show he hates cruelty, and abuses of power, and the murder and torture of innocent people, and politically-driven violence. and he acts on his moral compass rather than a set or defined philosophy, but it's absolutely absurd to act like someone who grew up homeless and dearly wished to protect the weak has zero understanding of how classist violence works. like sure you can't point to any one time where he looks at the camera and starts to quote marx, but out of any character in the entire series, wwx would probably has the strongest understanding of class

the second paragraph really confused me but I think they think that the subjugation of the wens post-ss was...eating the rich? and not the political fallout from a handful of powerful sects stepping into the power vacuum and enacting violence upon their conquered blood enemies. strictly speaking the wens that wwx rescued weren't in danger because they were poor, they were in danger because their once-powerful family was being targeted. but it's not like granny wenand uncle four were living in mansions like they WERE essentially commoners and they were being abused by wealthy and well-trained warrior class so it just doesn't hold up? a big defense of the wens was that they were literally farmers with no possible defense against cultivator's violence.

yeah this isn't very coherent but tl;dr I guess I see why people don't consider the wen massacres a class issue, and wwx's principles aren't as specific when it comes to like...structural analysis of the society he's living in, but his moral compass does point him towards people who are vulnerable and in a society with such strong class hierarchies, that absolutely includes the poor, which he knows because he USED TO BE HOMELESS. so no I don't see him overthrowing the sects and trying to establish a socialist society but he absolutely has an understanding of class wrt power dynamics

[izanyas]

Hello!! this is the anon who asked to know more abt the atc world, thank you so much for replying to my ask :)) could you please tell me more about the anatomy and more about the betas cuz in many of the traditional a/b/o verses I've read betas are kinda discriminated. also does the concept of mating and bonding apply for atc?

hello! :) the anatomy in atc isn't really a part of the status separation. i made a point not to focus on that. you can have people of any body sort in any of the three statuses, the main "difference" is in the scent (which can actually be inaccurate from birth—see: meng yao) and the fever cycle (which isn't always present either, or not always in the same way—see: wen ning), the perceived general outside traits... but like with gender irl those traits are way overstated (like women being shorter than men—tons of women are taller than the average man, it's not even uncommon). wei wuxian in standards of beauty doesn't conform to a lot of these assumed traits, and some others don't either (wen yueying, wen qing...).

wei wuxian is intersex and able to become pregnant, but i won't be developing overly much on how that presents itself for him appearance-wise because i think it's rather in bad taste to obsess over that. he has a vagina and a womb, if that's what you're desperate to know. his being intersex manifests in other visible and invisible ways in his body and i've decided on all of it, i did so from the beginning, so i know what they are, but i don't think the readers need to know. there are cis kunze (wen ning, xue yang, meng yao, etc) and trans kunze (luo fanghua, wen yiqian) but gender isn't an actual point of discrimination or differentiation in atc. the whole concept of gender has been replaced by the concept of statuses. so gender is kind of like just another physical trait, like hair color or height or just clothing choices i guess. it doesn't mean anything wrt discrimination, and biology doesn't either.

i'm not gonna pretend it's a super well-developed and failsafe AU in that regard because frankly it's impossible to just completely rewrite gender-based discrimination with fantasy gender-based discrimination. but i didn't want to focus on genitalia because 1) genitalia isn't all there is to gender-based discrimination irl, far from it, 2) i find it weird and i don't want to do it. this way i get to allow trans and non-binary(*) characters to exist within any status. win-win.

therefore, kunze aren't all able to become pregnant and their role in society isn't to provide children anyway, since a child born of a kunze will be considered a bastard. they're seen as rare tradable goods. having kunze concubines is like having anything else that is expensive or rare. it's a statement of wealth and prestige as well as a personal pleasure.

as for zhongyong, it's not discrimination per se, but they are exempt from usual positions of power or notoriety. so they usually don't become heirs unless there aren't any qianyuan to pick up the mantle (nie huaisang). well ig it is discrimination when i say it like that. but the real divide of oppression is between kunze and the rest.

if you think all those assigned traits are stupid then you are right, they are, they are completely man-made and easily proven wrong/inaccurate and far from affecting everyone the same. just like gender irl. that's the point.

no mating or bonding in atc :) and no knotting or self-lubing assholes either afgdjhsksdf. i know a/b/o was created with fantasy/animalistic traits like those specifically in order to spice up smut fic, but since then a lot of ppl have added a social commentary to it, and since i wanted to write about the social aspect and not the smut, i decided not to include the sexual behaviors. this isn't judgment on my part btw. i just wanted to try writing an a/b/o social commentary fic that i thought would make as much sense as possible bc all the ones that i tried reading didn't satisfy me. but like... omegaverse isn't real anyway. there's no rules or anything. everyone go write your mating bonding knotting smut and have fun. that's what the bonding knotting smut was made for in the first place.

(*) i'm using "non-binary" loosely here because considering the setting i don't believe the vernacular can be so directly translated or assimilated to what we see as non-binary today. but yeah just know there are people in atc who are neither man nor woman, or not exactly, or a bit of both, or something else altogether, etc etc

[carolyncaves]

And here we are: the 5th and final installment of WWX Goes to Gusu, aka What Actually Changes As A Result? This AU went a lot farther than I ever expected it to, and I’m so glad it did, I had a lot of fun writing it - thanks to everyone who’s taken the time to join me in it, now or in the future! 4812 words + postscript, the gang’s all here in this one, vague mental illness Wei Wuxian and now-married Wangxian, minor background pairings, some angst and sadness (I couldn’t completely save Wen Ning from his canon fate), a terrible party (that CQL staple) but in a potentially better way this time

part one | part two | part three | part four | also on ao3

“I thought I told you not to overdo it,” Jiang Cheng said to him lowly, as he and Wei Wuxian made their way together back down the mountain toward Jinlintai.

“Didn’t you hear that Jin-gongzi at the opening ceremony, though? He practically begged me. I wasn’t blindfolded, but I think I lived up to his invitation.”

“So it was on purpose, then? You set out to catch half the mountain in our nets? It wasn’t because you didn’t know your own power?”

Wei Wuxian didn’t know how to respond to that, so he didn’t at all. There would be time for that later, when they weren’t sharing a hillside with a hundred cultivators – or never, if he really had his preference.

“It’s fine,” Jiang Cheng said, before the question or its answer could agitate him. “We’ll work with it. It certainly made a statement, and if the point is to remind the Jin sect they don’t rule the world, a ridiculous display of power from the Jiang sect head disciple isn’t the worst thing that could have happened.”

Wei Wuxian thought ‘not the worst thing that could have happened’ was a low bar to set, but wasn’t about to argue with him about it.

At that point left Jiang Cheng left Wei Wuxian’s side and made his way over to confer with Shijie. That was for the best. She would probably be clearer in the retelling of the previous tense confrontation than Wei Wuxian would be. Somewhere in the middle the Jin cousin had said something too far, something about Lan Zhan and a demonic cultivator like him, and Wei Wuxian’s brain had gone white and his core had gone black, black, black with smoke. He didn’t know why he hadn’t torn that blowhard to pieces. Lan Zhan and Shijie must have stopped him.

And then Shijie, Shijie, stood in the center of a bunch of loud, arrogant men and cut every one of them down.

A part of Wei Wuxian was itching to abandon this banquet – to get away from the Jins and particularly that one, with his lousy attitude and even lousier manners, and from Yao-zongzhu and his ilk. He imagined forgoing a stuffy room full of fake, stuffy people and walking the public boulevards with a bottle of baijiu, agreeably alone in that crowd instead of under a thousand eyes in the customary one. He hadn’t forgotten the welcome ceremony, the archery range with its human targets. He’d been furious since then, in a way he’d started to think maybe he’d grown too cold to be anymore. Furious at the treatment of the Wen prisoners, furious at his impotence under the shake of his brother’s head.

Lan Zhan had taken his headband from his forehead and given it to him. Right in front of the entire world. He and Wei Wuxian were married, so he was allowed to do that. And he wanted to.

Wei Wuxian had stepped up to the targets – innocent people in front of him, guilty ones behind. Lan Zhan watching him, Jin Guangshan watching him, Shijie and Jiang Cheng and the peacock and Jin Guangyao. He had no golden core, just euphoria and fury swirling in his blood. He had to nock his bow and do this right. There were innocent people in front of him. There was no other option.

It was enough. He was enough. He just had to keep being enough.

He’d felt like too much on the mountain, when everyone was arguing with him. He felt like too much now. To make himself feel better, he looked over at Lan Zhan.

Lan Zhan, who today wore blue, a darker color than Wei Wuxian had ever seen him in. Darker than the baby blue of his forehead ribbon. Light for a Jiang, but unmistakably something that placed him with them – though the white wasn’t gone, showing in his inner layers and the embroidery down the sides of his collar. Wei Wuxian liked it. He looked … Wei Wuxian’s and himself at once. It was exactly how Wei Wuxian wanted him to look for all their days.

Lan Zhan, who despite not knowing about the flute playing advance, had immediately jumped to Wei Wuxian's defense when Jin Whoever accused him over it. Who’d said things like, “You stand before us and think we should know your name. How can you say Wei Ying is too proud?” “Wei Ying doesn’t need to carry his sword. I carry mine.” “If you think you have more capability than Wei Ying or myself, show me.”

Lan Zhan, who’d stood next to him, right next to him, and maintained a steady grip on his arm even as tears leaked out of Wei Wuxian’s eyes and he didn’t know how he was going to bear standing there and continuing to exist from one second to the next. That feeling had receded fast, fortunately, and Lan Zhan hadn’t let go of him until it was gone.

Lan Zhan, who was now looking at him.

Wei Wuxian made his heart settle, banished any remaining errant thought of leaving the group. He couldn’t be anywhere else when his husband was here. He smiled back at him.

Lan Zhan moved toward him like a river moved downhill.

As soon as he reached his side, he put a hand under his elbow, so they were walking as one.

“If you’re not careful, Lan Zhan, people will think something scandalous.” Nothing could be scandalous between them, really, but Wei Wuxian felt compelled to tease.

Lan Zhan did not rise to the bait, nor did he remove his hand. It was amazing how a few lifelong vows had emboldened him. “You did not need to play,” he said. “To use your cultivation today.”

Ah, that. “It was for the hunt, Lan Zhan.”

“The crowd hunt is a game.”

“Yes, and I did it for show, for helping Jiang Cheng secure power. He asked me to do it, we worked it all out in advance.”

“Jiang Wanyin has no call to ask that of you.”

“Lan Zhan, are you jealous? You are! You both really are two pieces of work. Jiang Cheng is my shidi and sect leader. You are my beloved husband and partner – in cultivation and all other things. I know I am not quite a whole man, but still, surely there is enough of me to spread between you." This routine was meant entirely in jest, but as was sometimes the case with jests, Wei Wuxian felt like he'd struck himself somewhere vital saying it.

Lan Zhan still seemed dismayed as well. “You are your whole self. But what of you? How much of you do you retain?”

“The whole part you have, I have,” Wei Wuxian promised, leaning closer into Lan Zhan, letting him carry his weight. “This modest, simple Wei likes how much you have of him.”

Lan Zhan hmphed. “You are not modest.” Then, with no humor: “You chose not to tell me.”

“I’m sorry, Lan Zhan. I didn't want you to worry about it the whole time. You can play Cleansing for me three times this evening to make up for it.”

Lan Zhan’s face took on a look of despair, and Wei Wuxian realized that was probably not a kind thing to have said. This wasn't banter.

“I’m sorry, Lan Zhan,” he said again, and this time he tried to say it seriously. “I needed to do this for Jiang Cheng. I’m going to have to use it sometimes. But I’m sorry I didn't tell you beforehand. I shouldn't, we ..." He stopped and grabbed Lan Zhan's hand, turning it palm-up and putting his hand overtop of it. The others would get ahead of them, but they could catch up. "I should have told you. I know. I just don’t like to make you sad."

"You are harming yourself."

"It's my way of doing good in the world, Zan Zhan." It's the only one I have left, he didn't say where someone might be around to overhear them, but he knew Lan Zhan understood it. "Would you really begrudge me of it?"

Lan Zhan's hand tightened around Wei Wuxian's own, like he was fighting a violent internal war and Wei Wuxian was his lifeline. That wasn't quite true – Wei Wuxian himself was the one putting Lan Zhan through this in the first place. There was nothing to be done about it, though. The other person's battles were unavoidable now that they occupied shared territory.

Wei Wuxian wouldn’t terribly mind letting Lan Zhan eviscerate all his enemies for him. He certainly wouldn’t mind lying down somewhere small and private and listening to Lan Zhan play sweet healing music for him. Then he would beckon him over and take his husband in his arms. He shook those thoughts out of his head. They still had work left to do here today.

"Never mind it now, Lan Zhan. We have a banquet to attend. Afterward, we can talk all night.”

“You must sleep.”

“And so must you, but if my Lan Zhan needs his husband to soothe him, that will of course take precedence." He caressed his free hand down Lan Zhan's shoulder, a gloriously intimate gesture for a public space, one he could make because they were married.

“I am always soothed, simply being with you," Lan Zhan replied – though he wasn't arguing. He said it softly, like an embrace.

"Ah, Lan Zhan, I think if you look back to our younger days, you will find that is fundamentally not the case!"

Jiang Cheng, who’d apparently hung back, called over his shoulder that they were being sickening, and Wei Wuxian hastened down the slope so he could shove him. Jiang Cheng and Lan Zhan glowered at each other. Shijie smiled and scolded them.

She scolded Lan Zhan sometimes, now – not quite the way she scolded Jiang Cheng, the free and easy way of people who'd been doing this all their life (scolding and being scolded respectively) and knew exactly what it meant between them. Lan Zhan was too new for that, they were too much strangers, so when she chastised her Difu it was gently, politely, obviously affectionate. She was inoculating him to the play-biting that went back and forth between the three of them, indoctrinating him into having a elder sister who knew better. Lan Zhan, for his part, seemed baffled by both the behavior and his own unquestionable yearning for it. The first time it happened, he was very disoriented, wounded and remorseful and bewildered. She had sat with him and touched his hand and cooked some traditional Lan food for him afterward, in apology. But now he was easing further and further into it with each exposure. He never argued back – perhaps never would, since it wasn't really like him, at least with anyone who wasn't Wei Wuxian – but he was absorbing the lesson that affection could sound like chastisement when it was meant right.

Coming from the Lan sect, where affection took the form of 3000 severe and limiting and unfun rules, Wei Wuxian would have thought he would have grasped it more quickly.

When they reached Jinlintai, the peacock was waiting at the top of the steps for them. Well, for Shijie, but he bowed to the rest of them to be cordial.

Jin-furen had asked Shijie to accompany her privately back to Jinlintai, saying she would convince Jin Zixuan to come see her and apologize, and Shijie had said, “I must go with my family to the banquet, as a representative of the Jiang sect, but I would be quite pleased to speak with Jin-gongzi there.” And apparently Jin-furen had made it happen. The peacock escorted Shijie inside with sure, careful honor, even after making a complete fool of himself over her in front of everyone on the mountain.

That was the first time Wei Wuxian was willing to consider that – perhaps – the peacock might love Shijie enough to be worthy of marrying her.

The rest of them filed in and found their seats – Wei Wuxian’s with Lan Zhan on one side and Jiang Cheng on the other. Jin Guangshan toasted Jiang Cheng, and Jiang Cheng gave all their prey to the other sects. This was probably necessary, after the way people had reacted, and Wei Wuxian made himself stand up and say a few empty pleasant words. He probably came across a little stiff over having to act like what he’d done and what he’d learned were nothing. It was fine, though, would be fine for Jiang Cheng. Anyway, let them think it was nothing. Let them underestimate him – or let them know he could do far more if he wanted.

Then, Wei Wuxian turned his back for one moment – to share a quiet snicker with Nie Huaisang over something unrelated and entirely too lewd for this formal setting – and when he turned around, Jin Zixun was deeply overcommitted in harassing Lan Zhan.

He started out ostensibly harassing Lan Xichen, but Lan Zhan had gone over to speak with his brother, and Jin Zixun was targeting both of them. Wei Wuxian restrained himself for the count of three, the count of five. Maybe Lan Xichen would dissuade him. The rest of room was quiet, but Wei Wuxian’s blood was loud. What was the matter with this man? Everyone knew the Lans didn't drink by doctrine. Was this revenge for Lan Zhan's words on the mountain, an attempt to humiliate the Lan sect in retaliation? Jin Guangyao tried to talk him down, but he was toothless, had no bite. Why in the world was Jin Guangshan just sitting there watching the First Jade of Lan consume alcohol against his will instead of calling his uncouth nephew to heel?

Jin Guangshan's eyes flickered to Wei Wuxian, just long enough they couldn't avoid meeting.

He'd been making sure Wei Wuxian was watching. This was retaliation, but not against Lan Zhan. Maybe Jin Zixun was truly an idiot, a petty, small man bullying polite people thinking it would win him face – but Jin Guangshan was letting him, the same way Jiang Cheng had excused him catching thirty percent of the prey on the mountain.

If it would hurt Wei Wuxian to see his husband suffer out of Jin Zixun's rudeness, if it would weaken him to embarrass the Lans, Jin Guangshan wanted it.

Wei Wuxian was taking the cup out of Jin Zixun's hand before he was even conscious of crossing the hall. The black rising energy must have gotten him there.

Wei Wuxian drank for Lan Zhan. Wei Wuxian spoke smooth and briefly to Jin Zixun. There was fear in the man’s eyes when he looked back at him, and he stepped away. Good. Jin Guangshan was the only other person he could see, and he looked much less relaxed and haughty than he had a moment ago. Very good. A servant came up beside them.

Except it wasn't a servant. But the moment he spent sorting that out, the half second it took his humming brain to identify dust-covered red from burnt orange, was all the time she needed.

Wei Wuxian would have recognized her in short order anyway – he’d spent a desperate week in her compound and two terrible days under her hand on a mountain, so he knew her carriage, her breath, and a simple disguise wouldn't have fooled him for long. But the hood of Wen Qing’s cloak fell back when she swung Jin Zixun around and pressed her knife to his throat, saving him even momentary confusion.

///

Lan Wangji would later have to recognize he did not notice Wen Qing's approach because Wei Ying had been the center of every thread of his attention.

Lan Wangji had wanted to disappear when Jin Zixun extended him the cup of wine. It put him in a position where he had no good path. Refuse, and coldly insult the host sect. Drink, and make a mockery of himself. Both would reflect poorly on his family, of birth and marriage. Both would diminish him, which would endanger Wei Ying. He had never been good with words or people, had few informal relationships. What he had was his reputation, and he was going to damage it here, one way or another.

Shufu had asked him if he was willing to have it dragged through the mud for Wei Ying. He was. But he had intended on preserving it long enough to be able to spend it on his behalf. This humiliation would be pointless.

Then Wei Ying stood above him.

The dark, bold lines of his form stood out against the colorful backdrop of Glamour Hall. His bold actions did likewise. The decisive movement of his hand. The contraction of his throat. His possessive words. Even the cold voice he spoke them in – those soulless tones sent a shiver down Lan Zhan’s spine like they always did, but he would at some future point grapple with the truth that this time, directed as they were at the detestable Jin Zixun in Lan Wangji’s open defense, that shiver was touched by something magnetic.

Lan Wangji was watching Wei Ying, as he always was, when it happened, with a contradictory mixture of alarm and awe.

He returned to himself immediately once he understood there was an intruder. He moved to draw Bichen. Wei Ying’s hand wrapped around Lan Wangji’s wrist, staying it.

“Wen Qing,” Wei Ying said.

Wen Qing.

She looked hollowed and worn, was covered in dirt and mud like a vagabond. She did not carry her sword. Lan Wangji tried to decide if he was personally moved by her hardship. She was the one who agreed to maim Wei Ying, tore that golden light out of him with her own skill. On the one hand, Wei Ying begged her to do it, and Lan Wangji faced the same struggle every day – between what Wei Ying wished to do and what would be good and safe and well for him. On the other, if he could not forgive himself for his failures there, why should he forgive her?

Her grip was ferocious on her knife and on Jin Zixun’s collar, but the blade never brushed his neck. “Tell me where the Dafan Wens are, or I'll kill you.”

Jin Guangyao had lurched far back when Wen Qing struck. His hand had flown to his waist and frozen there. Several Jin disciples who had been standing guard had hurried in, and every guest had risen and exposed the steel of their swords, but no one had made the decision to approach yet. Wen Qing had no escape, but a confrontation would surely end Jin Zixun’s life along with her own. Lan Wangji almost wished someone would be bold enough to take the initiative – but Wei Ying spoke of Wen Qing like a friend. And if she had some argument against Jin Zixun, Lan Wangji had to consider the possibility he would agree with her.

Wen Qing did not jerk Jin Zixun or twist his clothing. She just repeated her demand. “Tell me where they are. The old women and young children, the people who have never known how to fight. The disciples you attached lure flags to so they could serve as live bait in Ganquan. My brother, Wen Ning, Wen Qionglin. Where is he?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jin Zixun pled.

“Then you’re no good to me alive,” Wen Qing said, and Jin Zixun flinched.

“Do you think I know your brother by name? Do you think I have time to remember every disciple from the Wen sect?” He tried to sneer despite his obvious pathetic terror. “Besides, I thought your breed of Wen didn't kill people.”

“Who told you that?" The fear and fury rang through in her clear voice. "Who said to you that my family doesn't kill people?"

He said nothing, but the answer was plain enough.

“You’re right, Wen Qing doesn't kill people,” Wei Ying said. “But I do.”

“Wei Wuxian,” Jiang Wanyin interjected, alarmed.

“I don't mean anything by it. Only that we of course need to see this out. Wen Qing and Wen Ning did not fight against the allied sects during Sunshot – in fact, they sheltered Jiang-zongzhu and I from their own family. They saved our lives. In that respect, the cultivation owes the defeat of Wen Ruohan’s puppets to them.” And to Wei Ying himself, he was subtly reminding them. “We all know a great many Wens have been detained, but if they are being mistreated and used as live bait, if Wen Qionglin is in danger, I know Lanling Jin will be just as eager to get to the bottom of it as the rest of us." Wei Ying looked past Wen Qing, past Jin Zixun, and stared Jin Guangshan dead in the eye. Daring him to argue.

Dangerous. That was dangerous. Jin Guangshan was a man accustomed to being in power. Still, Lan Wangji admired it.

“You really brag about your use of Yin Iron?” Yao-zongzhu asked him from one side. “About hurting so many cultivators in the process on the battlefield?”

“She’s still a Wen, isn’t she?” Nie Mingjue said from the other. “Dafan Wen, Qishan Wen – it makes no difference. She did not act to stop Wen Ruohan. She is complicit.”

“She did shelter us,” Jiang Wanyin interjected, setting his shoulders nervously against his fellow sect leader. “She and Wen Ning took that risk.”

“The Dafan Wens have a long history as doctors who eschew violence,” Lan Xichen added, meeting Nie Mingjue’s gaze. “Both their skill and strong code of ethics are well-attested in the cultivation world’s histories.”

“Then you all see her hypocrisy,” Yao-zongzhu cried. “Is she threatening to perform a surgery on this Jin-gongzi?”

Luo Qingyang spoke out in reply. “If he takes her brother and treats those people like they aren’t people, why shouldn't she do the same?”

“Jin-gongzi,” Wei Ying said, sounding chillingly bored. “Why don’t you tell Wen-guniang where her brother is, before anyone in this room gets more agitated.”

Jin Zixun looked to Lan Xichen, to Jin Guangyao, to Jin Guangshan at the head of the room. No one came to his rescue. “Who are you to tell me what to do?” he snapped at Wei Wuxian. “Who are you to side with her in front of all these people?”

“I am Wei Wuxian. If I want to side with someone, who could stop me?”

Jin Zixun revealed that the relevant Wens were being held in a place called Qiongqi Path, and Wen Qing then made it clear she intended to take Jin Zixun with her as a hostage when she went there. Jin Guangshan looked like he’d eaten an unexpectedly sour plum, but seemed prepared to cut Jin Zixun loose. Wen Qing would likely be apprehended and stopped at some point in the unfolding of things – she would have few options even if she managed to get to Qiongqi Path with Jin Zixun, and nowhere to go with her brother if she secured him – but the odds were similarly poor for any hostage that went with her. Jin Zixun seemed aware of all these things and his behavior was growing increasingly distressed in response.

“Don’t worry, Jin-gongzi,” Wei Ying said, in a voice that would have deeply worried anyone. “I will escort you every step of the way.”

“As will I,” Lan Wangji intoned. He would hardly let Wei Ying go alone.

“And I,” Luo Qingyang asserted.

“And I,” Xichen said.

Lan Wangji’s head turned with the majority of the heads in the hall, including a bewildered Wen Qing’s.

“There are Lan sect disciples guarding the camp at Qiongqi Path,” Xichen explained. “I will go to ensure their safety, and to see with my own eyes what’s transpired there.”

Nie Mingue was staring at Xichen, his brow slightly furrowed. “I as well,” he said. “To ensure justice.”

“I will also come, with a group of disciples,” Jiang Wanyin declared.

“Then there is no need to drag me along on this wild hunt,” Jin Zixun wheedled. “This Wen bitch has her pick of hostages.”

“I will have a Jin,” Wen Qing said to Jin Guangshan, ignoring his waste of a nephew entirely. Jin Guangshan stared calculatingly back at her.

“I have better things to do with my time,” Jin Zixun argued back. “I won’t go along with this farce. You’ll have Luo-guniang if you want so badly to kill a member of the Jin sect.”

“Jin Zixun,” Wei Ying barked, hand straying dangerously toward Chenqing, which made Lan Wangji’s heart rise in his throat.

“I will go,” Jin Zixuan said, which stilled both of them.

“Wait,” Jin Guangshan said. He looked worried, now, for the first time. “Everyone, calm down, and we will take our time to discuss this.”

“There’s no need to be hasty,” Jin-furen simpered from beside him.

“I will discuss nothing until Wen Ning is safe in front of me,” Wen Qing replied icily.

“It makes sense. An elder sister will of course feel protective of her brother.” Jin Zixuan stepped forward, glancing over at Luo Qingyang and then at Jiang Yanli as he did so. “We will go without delay, and I will offer myself as a hostage, because I am sure Wen-guniang’s account is not wholly accurate. The truth of the situation will resolve it.”

The looks on Jin Guangyao’s and Jin Guangshan’s faces did not encourage Lan Wangji to agree with him.

Jiang Yanli had made her way silently over to Jiang Wanyin, and her hand curled around her brother’s arm. It seemed she intended to come as well.

It was this eclectic group that left the stunned remainder of the assembly at Glamour Hall and set off for Qiongqi Path. Wen Qing had no sword, so she instructed Jin Zixuan carry her on his. She vowed to kill him if someone tried to move against her, but it was obvious no one would. Despite all manner of vague political excuses, Wei Ying was going to help her recover Wen Qionglin, and the majority of the people in the band were going along to support – or at worst, keep a protective eye on – Wei Ying.

It turned out to be a very good thing they had all made the journey.

The camp was a disgrace. The guards were liars and cowards. Lan Xichen stayed back at the main encampment with the Jiang disciples, holding the Jin sect guards there at the point of Shuoyue. The rest of them proceeded down the slope and found the Wen dead – out in the open and unburied, tangled wherever they lay, half-submerged in water churned muddy by the torrential rain.

Wen Qionglin was among them. The lure flag still protruded from his corpse.

The crimes of the Jin sect were laid bare before them. Jin Zixuan looked as stunned as if someone had snatched his heart from his chest. Lan Wangji believed it was authentic. Jin Zixuan had often seemed to him self-absorbed, but not cruel. He remembered his brother’s words. The uninformed are not guilty. He wondered if he agreed with them. He wondered how anyone could be innocent after this. Luo Qingyang was speechless with fury. She threw her sect robes on the ground and stepped on them, grinding them into the muck. Nie Mingjue had left, gone back to the main encampment, trembling in unstable rage. Lan Wangji wondered what they would find there when they returned. Jiang Yanli wept silently. She had stayed out of the cesspool, but she did not look away. Jiang Wanyin’s face was drawn and pallid. He stared at the dead form of Wen Qionglin with a dull, slow horror. Wen Qing howled.

Lan Wangji was glad. He was glad for the mud. He was glad he was here in the driving rain. He was glad he could stand beside Wei Ying when he tore people apart for this. Because he would, surely. Wei Ying was going to cross many lines tonight, and Lan Wangji was glad he could go with him, without reservation or any regret.

///

Wei Wuxian looked for Lan Zhan through a blinding haze. There would be no healing music today. It was time for another kind, the kind Wei Wuxian played. This wasn’t showing off. This wasn’t a game. This was what he was here for. He found him, finally, and Lan Zhan nodded his infinitesimal agreement.

Wei Wuxian reached for that seething pool within him. It was overeager and insistent on a good day – now it surged over its borders and coursed through him. That would hurt later, as it had before, but he would deal with it then. When this was over, Lan Zhan would take care of him.

He put Chenqing to his lips and began to play.

/////

[So technically that’s the end, and this AU can go wherever you like from there. But if you’re interested in my opinion:

Wen Ning still gets zombified. Wei Wuxian probably doesn’t kill anyone he doesn’t want to kill while he’s doing it. Nie Mingjue doesn’t have a qi deviation.

With the exception of Lan Xichen and Nie Mingjue, who have to go back and be Sect Leaders and sworn brothers and play reasonable with the cultivation world, everyone else flees to Lotus Pier with the Wen remnants, and it’s like a third iteration of the increasingly messed up inter-sect summer camps.

Things are a little tense – technically they’re in rebellion against the Chief Cultivator, Jin Guangshan. But he’s not just gonna … march into Lotus Pier and burn it down. What, is he Wen Ruohan? Terrible optics, Jin Guangyao keeps reminding him, especially after this whole torturing-prisoners thing.

(Plus he’s not actually sure he’d be able to, against Wei Wuxian and his amulet. He’s heard some pretty fantastic things out of the generally reasonable mouths of the Lan and Nie sect leaders. He’s not sure what would happen to him or his sect if he went up against that force and failed, and he’d rather not find out.)

Wei Wuxian is still going a little crazy from going all in with the demonic cultivation and working night and day to bring Wen Ning back, but instead of aloneish starving in a cave, he's at Lotus Pier and everyone’s around. He's taken over a pavilion and plastered it with nets and talismans. Lan Wangji doesn't make him stop or sleep if he says he really can't. He does make him listen to Cleansing a lot.

Auntie Wen gets a nice guest room. Fourth Uncle helps refine the lotus wine. A-Yuan is absolutely still a miracle, and he also gets to eat good wholesome food whenever he wants it. Maybe Jiang Cheng is rich-gege this time. Or maybe that’s Jin Zixuan. Lan Wangji can be quiet-gege. He has several amazing jiejies. This new place with all the water is delightful.

Jin Zixuan is there as a ‘hostage’. "Yes, I'm definitely here against my will," he says, making puppy eyes at Jiang Yanli. It does offer Jin Guangshan additional motivation to not attack them.

Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng probably never have to stab each other.

Jiang Cheng spends an awkward amount of time watching Wen Ning be dead-ish. He keeps spending time with him once he’s undead. He’s always liked Wen Ning, some kind of baby sibling solidarity. In the long term, it turns out he did want a gentle admiring Wen sibling to go on dates with, he just started with the wrong one. The ghost general thing does not phase him.

Meanwhile, Wen Qing and Luo Qingyang are getting along like a lakehouse on fire: swimmingly.

Maybe Nie Huaisang saunters up to Lotus Pier about a month in and says ‘I’m here to negotiate, and perhaps to spy, yes, certainly’ when really he’s there to join the others! How could they leave him out! He was at the last two summer camps, and he knows he’s not the most obviously valuable player on their sorts of teams, but he thinks his wit and jovial spirit merit him a return invitation! (“You didn’t even invite me to your wedding, Wei-xiong, Lan-er-xiong.” “Jiang Cheng said I couldn’t because it would make the Jins mad – looks like that was a waste, huh, Jiang Cheng? We should have had a rude and extravagant affair after all.”)

I couldn’t really get any of this into the fic itself because I’m not trying to write a 100k epic, it had to end, but I’m attempting to eat my cake too by putting it all here.

I’m not sure how it might unfold after that, but my preferred interpretation is that everything generally turns out better. In canon, Wei Wuxian’s disruption of the banquet at Jinlintai is extremely scorched-earth, but in this scenario where Wei Wuxian doesn’t have to be the one throwing fighting words at the Jin sect and Jin Guangshan doesn’t have an opportunity to really demand the Yin Tiger Amulet, it might at least leave the door open for an eventual resumption of friendly relations between Wei Wuxian/the Jiangs and the Jins. Jin Guangshan can throw Jin Zixun under the bus and come out clean in the prisoner debacle, and if he’s frustrated the Jiangs now have ‘custody’ of the Wens and his sect has lost its elite status and his window for removing the Yin Tiger Amulet from a weakly-positioned Wei Wuxian is closing … there’s not much he can do about it.

And if he starts to take those frustrations out on the only son left in his house and/or he gets a little (self)destructive in his attempts to recoup power, and Jin Guangyao becomes his best self by committing patricide before he gets set up to marry his sister and then quitting while he’s ahead … I don’t think anyone’s going to complain. Jin Zixuan might be a little sad. Jiang Yanli can comfort him.]

[grewlikefancyflowers]

siiighh.. i guess we're talking abt wwx and jc's respective torturing antics again..

firstly, mdzs is not a text that takes a very positive view of gratuitous violence. it's not anti-violence, killing, even for personal revenge, is presented in more than one instance as fair and just. the message is that going too far, for personal satisfaction, too air out grievances, is wrong. not just because i guess it sucks for victims, but because holding that much resentment in yourself isn't good for you. case in point, jiang cheng. he harbours so much resentment, it poisons not only himself, but jin ling too.

'[Wei Wuxian] would have personally made a trip to the prison in the dead of night, ground Xue Yang into a pile of minced meat, then revived him and repeated the process multiple times over until Xue Yang regretted ever being born.'

this is in chapter 30, wwx doesn't come back from the dead thinking violence is wrong, torture is wrong. which is fine!! we don't have to 100% support everything our protagonist would do, especially when the setting is very much removed from everyday modern life. but in mdzs, the message isn't always 'doing xyz is wrong' but rather, 'why is [person] doing xyz, what's the motivation, what is to be gained from it, what will become of them if they go too far?'

thus, if we're taking abt morality, wwx targeted his revenge against the wens against the ones that specifically wronged him, he doesn't become blinded by his hatred, he still helps the wens who were innocent. jiang cheng targets his revenge against a toddler, against random unrelated people who happen to have the name 'wen,' his revenge against wwx is targeted against random people who used the same cultivation method as him (and just a reminder! this wasn't abt him targeting people he genuinely had reason to believe were dangerous - 'mxy' had not done anything wrong, and had in fact just saved his nephews life!).

anyway, i don't care much to dispute the morality of wwx vs jc wrt to torturing bc it's not that relevant!! torture is not presented as inherently wrong within mdzs. what's more important is what this means for the characters and their relationships to each other!!

baseless interpretations of mdzs that see jc as saddened by wwx's death, by being haunted by how he 'couldn't' help him in the past are contradicted by his canonical torturing of people who reminded him of wwx. you can throw any ideas of reconciliation out the window, do you think wwx is endeared by jc's actions?? no, he wants nothing to do with him. jc is resentful throughout mdzs, but his actions after wwx's death take him past the point of no return. what the torture says abt jc's morality is insignificant, we already have a comprehensive understanding of jc's moral standing, what is far more important is what it tells us abt how jc feels of his betrayal of wwx when he was alive, and if he regrets or is conflicted by his actions at all!! and the answer is no! he sees wwx as deserving of everything that happened to him, and would in fact like to make him suffer even more!

[plan-d-to-i]

I have to say, seeing the mess in the mdzs fandom (still relatively new here!) has me genuinely worried for any possibility of tgcf (main fandom!) ever blowing up in popularity like that (hopefully not). There are already many shitty takes around, especially wrt HC (is it just a black-red character thing? Ppl are so desperate for them to be actually evil or morally grey 😐), we don't need any more... I guess I'm mainly wondering if MQ stans would ever get as bad as JC stans. MQ as a character is definitely better than JC with actual redeeming qualities as you've pointed out yourself in the past (and he admitted to his faults in the end, ergo he is aware that he has them and made mistakes), but you still see many stans trying to take away his flaws and make him a purely soft but misunderstood poor boy who gets antagonized unfairly by everyone. Wwx and lwj barely even did anything to JC and ppl act as if they are devils incarnate, compared to that HC is fully hostile to MQ (with good reasons, imo, and I actually try to see both sides) and XL often points out MQ's shortcomings and ofc, FX's... everything, lol.

I think for svsss, SJ would be this specific character? (More extreme than the other two, though.) Ngl, I was actually surprised how much sympathy and love SJ gets in the fandom (Bing-ge doesn't get even half of it).

Anyway, sorry for rambling! The drama in the mdzs fandom and how much stans villanize actually good characters to defend their flawed favs shocked me, lol. And it's just confusing to me how ppl try to sympathize with their meow meow but never try to understand why other characters treat them the way they do. But blind stans...

ah ramble away!! We're absolutely on the same page. Truly nothing had prepared me for this fandom. I don't really project on characters when I read. I just want to be entertained, so to see so many ppl stan these underwhelming (to say the least) side characters so hard that they feel the need to change canon to make them into uwu soft babies and shit on the genuinely heroic characters!!? can't relate.

Shen Jiu has been almost totally ruined by his own stans 🥲. They just turned him into a generic YA heroine. rip Shen Jiu, you were so much cooler as you were written.

So I can understand the trepidation w tgcf's adaptation. There are already people bitching about how Xie Lian isn't "really that good! and his relationship w HC is toxic"🙃. I don't even think it's Mu Qing stans you have to watch out for. As you said Mu Qing is demonstrably better than jc and is thus rewarded with a reconciliation with the mc. I don't exactly vibe with that personality type but even I had to admit by the end Mu Qing was not in fact a shitbag. Just the fact that he broke the rules to take supplies to Xie Lian means something. All jc gave WWX when he was helping the Wens was a gut wound. Anyway, welcome to my theory : Qi Rong will be JC 2.0 sad angry uwu baby green grape 💚. The "eating people thing" was just mean rumors. He just wanted Xie Lian's love and attention >:-/ they were CoUsinS!! Xianle Bros! Cousins! Look at the way he cared for Gu Zi! # 1 DAD! Also he's known as the Green Ghost! DUH OBVIOUSLY this means he's Aromantic. And the way he helped Xuan Ji get revenge by killing all those women! Can you say FEMINIST KING!

[pharahsgf]

one thing ive noticed about jc is how people often say he had to do things all alone or was left behind alone when that's really not the case? like they say he lost his entire family when the wens took lotus pier while actually wwx and jyl were suffering with him, and they helped him rebuild lotus pier while only jc gets credit for it, and he is said to have raised jl alone when the jins obviously did more, and he's left 'all alone' in the end while jl is still there... i don't get it

Bad Things Only Happen To Jiang Cheng, Ever

the assertion that jiang cheng raised jin ling alone (Left Behind With A Baby™) is specifically annoying to me because every mdzs/cql blogger seems to fervently believe it despite it being very obviously incorrect. that last point abt jiang cheng being alone post-canon is kind of true? in the sense that he has no adult friends. but to me this isn't as much a jc angst point as it is a very predictable consequence of him being his worst possible self at all times.

the idea that only jiang cheng suffered from the fall of lotus pier is more interesting since it's actually invoked intradiegetically: while jiang yanli and wei wuxian obviously suffered every loss jiang cheng did during the sunshot campaign wrt lotus pier, jiang cheng frames himself as uniquely affected and posits wei wuxian as an outsider to more effectively blame him and deny him his grief. jiang yanli is given a bit more space to mourn her home, but her feelings are still treated as secondary to her ability to perform the caretaker role for her brothers.

jiang cheng rebuilding the jiang sect by himself is likewise mentioned within the text, but 2 me it seems unlikely. we KNOW wei wuxian & jiang yanli assisted in reestablishing the jiang sect politically during the sunshot campaign and in running the sect thereafter, and wei wuxian in particular contributed massively to the sect's wealth, status and influence through his dominance during the war. it also super doesn't help that this assertion comes from jin guangshan who a) is a fucking liar and b) wants to convince jiang cheng of wei wuxian's disloyalty and uselessness for the purpose of separating them. (not to mention that the sect leaders' effortless acceptance of jiang cheng as the only contributor is likely related to him being the only one among his siblings not marginalized in some way - jiang yanli being a woman and wei wuxian being lower class wrt how he's put down for being the son of a servant. ladies and gaydies always erased from #herstory 🙄)

[winepresswrath]

In the end, does JC not deserve one person who is fully ride or die? My Man, Right or Wrong? WWX has LWJ and Wen Ning, jiggy has Su She! LBH and LWJ are honestly equal and opposite forces. Actually LBH is way more OP than him, he can kill Hanguang jun for making you sad whenever you like? JC eventually votes no because he doesn't want to make WWX sad but he likes that LBH would and also thinks Gusu is a terrible place to live. A living insult to his culinary skills

MXTX is out there saying ABSOLUTELY NOT or possibly saying she was already extremely merciful wrt the Jin Ling issue, what else could he want?

Part of the fun of Luo Binghe is that he can play on protagonist terms, which Jiang Cheng cannot, and so yes he can smugly beat Hanguang-Jun at everything including cooking. He can magically be a better guqin player than Lan Wangji but never actually do anything so annoying as attempt a serenade unless he is specifically demonstrating that he is better than someone Jiang Cheng hates. Generally I am very strongly opposed to letting Jiang Cheng win things but I think he'd be so confused and alarmed by his genre hopping suitor it actually works out.

[paradife-loft]

Oh how about... the ChengNing agenda

*evil cackling*

1. What made you ship it?

Ohh man.... ngl when I first heard about it I was very "eeeeugh?" bc I was, um, Offended in defense of my charming corpse son, considering there's, uh. Some significant dialogue in CQL that makes it pretty clear that Jiang Cheng (esp early on) does not.... think of fierce corpse’d Wen Ning as a person.

My mind was changed, however! due to a combination of learning that Yu Bin himself is onboard (and therefore feeling more open to, ok, well I guess if you who are presumably the #1 member of the Wen Ning Defense Squad if ZZJ and WHX are anything to go by, what might there be of interest here that I was overlooking?) - and then also seeing a few gifsets on here that featured parallels of Wen Ning carrying Jiang Cheng, holding him unconscious in a boat, etc. to visually similar scenes with Wangxian. Like. Narrative and aesthetic parallelism is a very significant consideration here for me in being willing to contemplate a ship, it turns out! XD

2. What are your favorite things about the ship?

Ahh, this is surprisingly difficult? I feel like I haven't really... tried to define what I think this ship is About to me before? Huh.

But I guess to take a stab at it... it's a combo of this being two people whose lives have been - entwined in a just slightly off-kilter way that gives a deep well of possibility for parallel knowledge and understanding, and then a whole big explosion of dysfunction (:3), and then - the opportunity to really face difficult pieces of their lives and worldviews and step into becoming... a little better? a little more than they'd thought, and richer for it? Like, they've been on opposite sides of events due to circumstance, and have eight zillion things to argue about, but I think in part it comes from a fairly similar attitude toward, well this is my sphere of responsibility and that's what I'm going to take care of above everything else. But at the same time, how much they've each lost or thrown away to do so... Yeah.

On a different note, I think there's something specifically brought out with Wen Ning as a character and the thematic resonances he has, that works quite well for me with how I see Jiang Cheng's feelings on sexuality as nebulous, and fluctuating, and hard to pin down or define clearly or offer up in an "acceptable" fashion to others' understanding. And that's pretty cool to me.

3. Is there an unpopular opinion you have on this ship?

Uhhhmmm, I guess I'm... really twitchy about the sort of humorous (or more serious) framing I'm seeing a bit more often now that's like "the two third wheels have run off on their own, haha!". Like I mean aside from the fact that as always, I'd much rather focus on what these characters are to each other than what they've failed to be to another ship (?????), that framing just... hits neatly on a lot of things that make me uncomfortable and unhappy with some approaches to Wangxian, and how people think about Couples in relation to their broader webs of significant relationships overall?

And so this sort of... implication of ~pairing up the two people who lost out on being #1 most important relationship to Wei Wuxian (so sad for them)!!! is uh. Major squicky to me. Idk, it's complicated because of course each of their feelings wrt WWX is a Big Deal, and Jiang Cheng especially has a lot of insecurity and pain about being abandoned? But I feel like there's different ways of approaching that, and some of it can just be.... eesh.

[gloriousmonsters]

i dunno, I just specifically hate wen ning and wei wuxian splitting up the way they had them do because (a) the angle of it feeling like wei wuxian was being cut out of the wen family, so to speak, which is weird and hurtful, and (b)....I really loved that Wen Ning was an autistic character that had a hard time on his own. like, there’s a lot of push-pull around his agency wrt to that, and people could stand to be better about it---recognizing more that he can make his own decisions, etc---but that’s faaaaaaar from ‘I’m Just Going To Be Fine Now. :) Who Knows Where I’ll Go But I’ll Make My Own Way’ and having him suddenly come out with that feels both OOC and a bit of a slap in the face

[tanoraqui]

I have been enjoying your MDZS live blogs a lot! I've read the novel but not watched CQL but I'm assuming you've read/watched both since some of the posts you're reblogging are for Untamed-only events/plot while others are for the novel. What are thoughts on the differences between the two - especially wrt the characterizations and plot events?

oh, you actually are new - no, I haven’t watched the show. I’m wildly nearsighted and can’t really follow shows with subtitles - like, I can generally follow the subtitles, but not without ignoring pretty much everything else on screen. But I read the book because I follow people who keep blogging about the show and it looked really interesting, so I went to consume it in the more convenient medium for me. Also a global pandemic started to affect me personally so I did the coping thing where you fling yourself bodily into a new work of fiction and read a 570k novel (according to the postscript) in five days. 

..okay and then I spent some time on youtube hunting down the specific tv show scene of Wei Wuxian driving Wens mad with haunting flute music and ghosts when he first gets out of the mountain, because that was aesthetic as fuck. I may try to find a few more scenes - I wanna watch some confrontations. But watching about an episode mostly just confirmed the fact that subtitled shows, whether live action or animated, just aren’t my thing.

I intend to now treat the show like...you know when you obsessively consume a work of fiction really fast, and then go obsessively read a ton of fanfiction, and it all happens so fast and back-to-back that you lose track of what’s canon and what’s fanon? That, but the blithe disregard extends to what’s show canon and what’s book canon. I may go read through wikipedia summaries of the episodes to see what the show changed, in case I’m missing something major. It sounds like we get more of Wen Qing in the show? Excellent. 

[ravenclawish]

Studying Dutch: a few websites (updated)

A while ago I made a post about Dutch websites that can help you practice your Dutch, and a bunch of lovely people added some websites to the original post so I figured it was time to update the post. The websites are now sorted into more specific categories to keep the post more organised. 

A special thanks to @onzin-en-talen​ for adding the Belgian websites!

Beginner (kids websites)

jeugdjournaal.nl is the website for het Jeugdjournaal (daily on tv for 7-10 year old kids). Easy language, so easier to follow. Daily news ‘episodes’, 15 minutes long.

ketnet.be is a Belgian kids channel. Check out karrewiet too!

More advanced: News

AD.nl is an online newspaper - it is for adults so if you want news that’s familiar to items you can find on your newspaper you could go to the topic Buitenland.

NU.nl is another online newspaper which might be harder to read so again, if you go to Buitenland you’ll find worldwide newsitems.

NOS.nl again, an online news website and a topic Buitenland.

destandaard.be is a Belgian newspaper. This is the Buitenland section.

demorgen.be I couldn’t find a Buitenland section, but they do have, among others, a Music and Technology section on which you can find interesting articles.

hln.be another Belgian newspaper. This is the link to the Buitenland section.

VRT NWS is the Belgian public broadcasting service’s news website.

More advanced: Sports

sportnieuws.nl offers the latest sports news in the Netherlands.

sporza.be is the Belgian public broadcasting service’s sport news site.

More advanced: TV

NPO 1 is the Dutch national broadcasting channel, here you can watch live TV.

bvn.tv is a website where you can watch Dutch TV (thank you, @join-the-dutch-clan​)!

uitzendinggemist.nl here you can watch TV too, this website uploads recent episodes you might have missed on TV.

More advanced: Magazines

humo.be is a Belgian magazine, which provides interviews. They also offer reviews of concerts, CDs, TV programs and movies.

knack.be is a magazine that offers news as well as interviews on their website.

More advanced: Radio 

onlineluisteren.nl offers all radio stations in the Netherlands, sorted by genre (if you scroll down). You can also find the regional channels on here! These offer more news about the province. 

qmusic.nl is the website for Dutch radio station Q Music. You can find music, videos from the studio and music related news on here.They mainly focus on pop.

radio 538 is another Dutch radio station, focused on pop. They have a section called Gemist that offers the latest interviews and other cool stuff they did.

stubru.be is a Belgian alternative rock radio station - @onzin-en-talen​ recommends the interview Linde Merckpoel had with Ed Sheeran. They offer music news and more. 

mnm.be is another Belgian radio station, which is more focused on pop.

Learning vocab

woordjesleren.nl is a website where you can look up lists of words and sentences from a lot of language methods we use in Holland. There are not only Dutch - English lists, but also Dutch - other languages. It isn’t that great though if you don’t have the schoolbooks that belong to the lists… There also is an app but that probably will only work if you’re in the Dutch Appstore.

wrts.nl wrts is short for woordjes which translates to words. I think it’s free - at least when I made my account. You can make lists by yourself, or download lists from woordjesleren.nl.

Let me know if you have any questions or are looking for something specific! Voor nu wens ik je veel succes en plezier!

[llycaons]

I talk big about in-character writing as if I wasn't 2 chapters into a wx AU of a desperately tragic yet very hokey movie called 'unleashed' about an orphan raised like a dog by a mob boss as an enforcer who breaks free from his captors and starts reconnecting with his humanity and this orphan hero is none other than lan wangji...

edit: I'm almost done and this is less offensively bad that just....deeply odd. long rambling post under the cut

this is why I tend to dislike AUs based on very specific works - the characterizations and relationships just don't match and it feels like reading another story. because it IS.

first of all, why is this dehumanized and abused character manipulated into a weapon who lost his parents young and was treated like an animal lwj and not wwx? it would fit the story better. wwx (survivalist, very powerful, abused and used in canon) escapes and finds a lovely, stable, (wealthy), somewhat naive, caretaking piano teacher with a young son. he slowly recovers in a safe place as he grapples with his past of abuse and cruelty. he learns to love and be loved. but lwj is one of the wealthiest and most sheltered characters in the show! the choices simply do not make sense!

like...the lwj is decent, but that's only bc this lwj has been raised in very different circumstances and his core character traits (loving animals/music/wwx/small children, having a hidden humorous side, wanting to help people and generally unwilling to hurt the innocent) are somewhat simplistic. his other important traits (like his specific relationship with rules, his character arc as it related to his sect, how he acts wrt his privilege) don't really get a chance to manifest in this situation. he's pretty straightforward, which just makes the wx dynamic pretty boring.

based on his thoughts and dialogue, wwx just thinks he's just a hot sweetheart and so so good and brave. which he IS ig, but it's lacking the drama or intrigue or flair of canon. canon wwx didn't fall in love with simply a good brave kind sweetheart, he fell in love with someone with very strong principles that aligned with his, who challenged him at every turn and surprised him with his hidden sweet side and caretaking streak and humor and eventual willingness to break rules. who is also hot and good at swordfighting. there's shades of this to the relationship, but it's ultimately just a watered-down and decontextualized version of canon. and the draw of wwx and lwj and their relationship has so much to do with canon that this AU is just kind of boring and irrelevant to read

speaking of which, the wwx is VERY odd and somewhat insulting. he's currently a single dad of a-yuan (🙄, and side note but wq and wn aren't even RELATED to the bad wens???? way to drop a really important and thematically relevant detail), and he's a building super so he collects rents, and his personal history is similar to college except he has this really strange characterization around college and in this entanglement with this woman whose death he feels responsible for. like he describes himself as a failing student who drank way too much without getting into the why of it all or the other people who were definitely in his life at the time, also canon wwx at that same age was still a highly prolific and celebrated author even in the midst of severe trauma AND alcoholism. and he described himself and this oc woman as 'two shitty people who had nobody else to be shitty with' or something and then talked about how she was an addict and it was just a really strange and and insulting (to addicts) and ooc direction for his character to be taken.

like wwx always had a ton of friends except for when he was a social pariah for saving people from literal death camps and even then the wens and his siblings really cared about him so idk why his primary social connection is this oc woman whose only purpose is to have a baby and then be a bad mother/partner and then die to make wwx feel angsty. like, he does talk about her ballet skills and her intelligence and her humor but her role in the story is pure plot device. it must be from the original movie but it's SO random and shitty and ooc and cruel to addicts? and if you write an AU for a fanfic that you want to make sense you really have to actually alter the other work a bit to accommodate the other relationships and character dynamics. it would have made more sense for wwx to be barely scraping by while working three jobs and getting disowned by the jiangs and still getting straight As even if he struggled with alcoholism. and then he still would have taken in a-yuan if the alternative was the foster system. a-yuan's biological parentage and wx's adoption of him is genuinely so important oh it makes me mad they erased that

speaking of family, the jc and jyl aren't too bad and the jfm is mostly fine but the myu is bizarre. instead of the abusive, out of control, shaming, self-centered, violent woman from canon who literally hates wwx's guts, she's a kind of sharp divorcee whose method to curry favor with her grandchildren is to buy them expensive gifts and who asks nosy but well-meaning questions about wwx's love life. I do think myu would dote on a grandchild, but NOT if it was wwx's. his role in the jiangs is a little difficult to translate completely accurately to a modern setting, but her dislike for him and her blame on him for ruining her marriage and being better than her son is a really important part of her character. adult wwx would by all rights offer her the respect she is due as his parental figure, but would likely avoid her when possible and need to seek support from other people in his life when he interacts with her. and I don't think he'd easily let her be a part of his child's life. because she abused him as a child and teenager!

[cancersfakianakis1]

Survival impact of waiting time for radical radiotherapy in nasopharyngeal carcinoma: A large institution-based cohort study from an endemic area

Publication date: March 2017 Source:European Journal of Cancer, Volume 73 Author(s): Hu Liang, Yan-Qun Xiang, Xing Lv, Chang-Qing Xie, Su-Mei Cao, Lin Wang, Chao-Nan Qian, Jing Yang, Yan-Fang Ye, Feng Gan, Liang-Ru Ke, Ya-Hui Yu, Guo-Ying Liu, Wen-Ze Qiu, Xin-Jun Huang, Can-Hong Wen, Na You, Xue-Qin Wang, Xiang Guo, Wei-Xiong Xia BackgroundWhether the waiting time for radical radiotherapy (WRT) detrimentally impacts nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) prognosis is unclear. We estimated the influence of WRT on overall survival (OS) and disease-specific survival (DSS) of NPC.Patients and methodsPatients were identified from prospectively maintained database. WRT was calculated from histological diagnosis to initiation of radiotherapy (RT). Survival analysis was estimated using Weibull parametric model and propensity score analysis (PSA). Recursive partitioning analysis (RPA) identified optimal WRT threshold via conditional inference trees to estimate the greatest survival differences based on randomly selected training and validation sets, and this process was repeated 1000 times to ensure threshold robustness. Sensitivity analysis estimated effects of potential unmeasured confounders.ResultsA total of 9896 patients were included. In multivariate analysis, WRT of 31–60°d, of 61–90°d and of greater than 90°d independently increased mortality risk compared to less than 30°d. Upon RPA, ranges of 30–35°d with the peak of 30°d were confirmed with 89% of simulations validating optimal thresholds. In threshold-based groups, adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) for WRT of greater than 30°d by both Weibull model and PSA were significantly higher than for WRT of less than 30°d [OS: HR = 1.13, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.04–1.23, P = 0.003; DSS: HR = 1.15, 95% CI 1.05–1.26, P = 0.002]. Sensitivity analysis revealed robustness of results.ConclusionsWRT independently affects survival. Increasing WRT beyond 30°d was most consistently detrimental to survival. WRT of NPC should be as short as reasonably achievable (ASARA). http://ift.tt/2kyDwbJ

[pharahsgf]

i saw wwx giving up his core as a very heavy sacrifice tbh. it's not inherentily bad or shouldn't be allowed, but it doesnt change the fact that he still made, i think, one of the most important decisions in mdzs/cql ever. bcs, where would jc have been without that core? i get that he also "sacrificed" himself for wwx and got captured by the wens, which led to his core being melted, but he was Very Clearly miserable bcs of it and im p sure he was prepared to die. did he really think wwx would let that happen? (there's also a lot of discussion to be had about the meanings and metaphors behind the core surgery, w wwx loving his brother but also maybe having done out of a sense of responsibility bcs of yzy, etctectetcetctec. everyone will come out w a different take on this lol) BUT the most annoying thing is when ppl (specifically jc fans) try to put to blame on wwx for giving jc the core, because.... he shouls have asked him first??? and poor a-cheng was hurt bcs of it??? like do these ppl realise that for wwx, it was either that or a certain death for jc, since it truly seemed like he couldnt live on without a core?

yeah like! wei wuxian didn't necessarily make the most... diplomatic choices wrt the core transfer but lbr he had no good options there. he had to give away his core or risk losing jiang cheng forever, thereby throwing the future of the jiang clan in jeopardy and failing the final task jiang fengmian gave him. and he chose the path where jiang cheng could be happy and the jiang sect could thrive, with strictly his own future and happiness as collateral. no one's a winner here but wei wuxian is undeniably worse off, especially when you consider mme yu and jiang fengmian's abusive behaviour most definitely contributed to the ease with which he threw his life away for his brother.

jiang cheng otoh... got exactly what he wanted without having to give anything in return. the only way in which this is a negative development for him is that he now looks bad in the way he's acted towards wei wuxian, which should have always been the case anyway. acting like he's the victim is so backwards it's making me dizzy