#swbts

[annie-handholder]

one of my favourite things in the radiant emperor duology is how the author keeps bringing up how strikingly beautiful Ouyang is but how absolutely fucking hideous Zhu is

[3cosmicfrogs]

Spring hunt.

[aytmadashis]

I bring a sort of PETTY BITCH vibe to the REVENGE COUP PLOT that GENERAL OUYANG don’t really like

[swordsonnet]

zhu and ouyang truly have the dynamic of all time. their fates are inextricably entwined. they're the same and yet they're opposites in many ways. they're the only ones who can truly understand each other and yet they're usually at odds with each other. they're extremely powerful together and yet they spend much of the story on opposite sides. she kills 10,000 of his men. he cuts off her hand. he lets her see him at his most vulnerable. she cares for him even after he betrays her. they have weird bdsm scenes that are technically nonsexual but still manage to be intensely erotic. they pretend to be married once. they're besties they're worsties they're queer solidarity and queer hostility they're enemies with benefits they're fucked-up soulmates. they're not romantic or platonic or a secret third thing but an even more secret fourth thing. who's doing it like them

[papenathys]

No amount of daily "I want sexy female villains to step on me uwu" posts will combat the actual reality of people across all fandoms and all media coming together to violently hate on female villains for doing the exact same thing male villains are praised for. Maybe even a fraction of it.

You all don't want female villains, you want palatable watered down sexy girlbosses. Anything more intense, anything more "un-feminine" and darker and more complex will have you going pee pee poo poo "I HATE HER SHE IS UGLY AND MEAN 🥺🥺🥺😠😠😠😠🤮🤮🤮" while hyping up The Most™ boring bland generic flavourless male incel character of all time because you just "happen" to resonate with him strongly. Lmao.

[anarchistbitch]

hey do u mind if im ur weapon . like if im the sword that u wield recklessly, giving no heed to ur safety nor mine. just like casually lol

[erisenyo]

It's here! The Fandom Trumps Hate charity auction listings are officially live, with auctions opening February 25 and running until March 1st!

Find my auction page here and submit a bid when it opens for a chance to have me create a custom work for you! I'm offering a 5-10K written work in both the ATLA and Radiant Emperor fandoms this year.

Some examples of my prior Fandom Trumps Hate works include...

To Open Every Door to Night, To Meet Each Rising Sun

Lessons in Proper Asset Management

That Love You've Been Looking For

Just Get On Your Knees (Say Pretty Please)

All The Ways You See Me

And I generally love working off prompts, collabs, gift fics, and requests!

Please don't hesitate to reach out with any questions, for any examples of my work (prompted or unprompted), and please also check out the other talented ATLA and LOK creators, and the listing from @astrarche-x for the Radiant Emperor!

(And if physical fanworks are more your speed? Fanbinding? Embroidery? Candles? Check out the Crafts Bazaar!)

[detweilerboy]

Twin Threads is a 2021 crime thriller film written and directed by Shelley Parker-Chan. The film follows a group of young assassins, lead by Zhu Yuanzhang, sent to eliminate the heir to a rival criminal syndicate. Between them and their target stands Ouyang, a bodyguard with a mysterious past and conflicting loyalties.

From left to right: Ouyang & Zhu, Wang Baoxiang, Esen, Ma Xiuying, Xu Da and Chang Yuchun

I ended up leaning more into the noir poster aesthetic than I originally planned so I changed things around in regards to this AU. Noir isn't a particularly Chinese genre for historical reasons, but there are a few contemporary mainland Chinese neo noirs (I recommend Black Coal, Thin Ice). The contemporary western neo noir on the other hand is heavily inspired by Hong Kong action cinema, or East Asian action/crime cinema in general.

This AU turned into a love letter for Raymond Chandler (in spirit and fic writing that started this whole project), Hong Kong action thrillers, especially Johnnie To films but John Woo, Tsui Hark and Ringo Lam as well. Not a small part of this is also stolen from Wong Kar-wai, as well as the film Infernal Affairs.

The poster here owes more to classic noir posters as well as Takeshi Kitano's yakuza movies but also City on Fire (and Reservoir Dogs). But Johnnie To's The Mission, Election and Exiled have black and red color schemes as well.

Consider this a movie that probably wouldn't exist but is pulling from a pool influences between East & West and is just stuff i think is cool. Organized crime AU because it is a way to write a modern AU that keeps the brutality and violence of the original, as well as the pressure of hierarchy and tradition & games of thrones.

[tumblerislovetumblerislife]

she who became the sun

including but not limited to:

1) monk zhu who is DEFINITELY above worldly desires 2) there are many benefits to having a hand made of light (gee i sure wonder who's holding the knife?) 3) guys i think they used ye olde photoshop on zhu's emperor portrait

zhu kicking their feet & giggling @ ma (unfortunately no hair to twirl)

some modern zhus!

(image description below the cut because it got super long!)

[ID: digital art of the character zhu chongba/yuanzhang in the radiant emperor series in the first image, and then nine close-ups. the background is yellow and imitates rays of sun, dividing the image into sections, from the center of the sun, counter-clockwise.

section 1: zhu's head and neck. she is a chinese person with dark-brown eyes, shaved hair, and moles on her face and neck, looking down and smiling slightly. there are two slits in their eyebrows, and they are wearing a gold nose ring and various black and gold studs and rings in their ears.

section 2: two simple drawings, an arrow between them, labelled above with *OUYANG POV*. the first is zhu's face, drawn cartoonishly so that the cheekbones are very wide and the chin is very narrow, creating a triangle. the second is a cicada's face that looks very similar to the cartoonish zhu (the eyes replace zhu's ears and its mandibles replace zhu's chin).

section 3: three drawings of zhu, inspired by canon. the first is zhu as a monk, wearing orange robes and with ordination scars on her scalp. her head is angled down, but her eyes are raised. the second is zhu in he who drowned the world, her hair slightly grown out with a gold hairpin and wearing golden robes. someone is pointing a knife at her and she is smirking like the cat meme, her mandate of heaven illuminating her missing hand, which is showing the middle finger. the third is zhu as emperor, looking more masculine and attractive than the other images. she is wearing blue and gold robes with a dragon embroidered on them and a gold hair crown and pin.

section 4: zhu's profile, smiling after a flash of brown hair. they look modern, wearing a light-blue sleeveless turtleneck with an ace flag and she/they pin as well as a gold nose ring and multicoloured jewellery in their ears. her hair is shaved, but growing out slightly and there are two slits in her eyebrows, and two lipstick kisses on her cheek and corner of her mouth. they are surrounded by pink light, hearts and sparkles, and there is a heart reflection in their eye.

section 5: five drawings of modern zhu. the first is her eyes and thick eyebrows in greyscale, wearing yellow eyeliner that imitates the sun. the second is from the waist up, zhu smiling with their eyes closed, wearing a patterned white and green button-up and leather belt, along with multicoloured pieces of jewellery. the third is zhu's whole body, folded up in a seated position. she's wearing a yellow shirt with white flowers on, grey and brown checkered pants with a green belt, black and gold socks, and purple sneakers, along with jewellery and a gold choker. the fourth is zhu's nose and mouth, showing their nose ring and smile. the fifth is zhu from the knees up. she's looking sideways, right arm held to her head and wearing a bright multicoloured shirt and clashing striped pants over a black crop top, along with a nose ring and sun earrings. /end ID]

[creechur-docx]

Spoilers for hwdtw!

can we talk about zhu's genderfuckery. she's a girl when girl-on-girl violence is thematically relevant, and he's a dude mostly to piss ouyang off and be best bros with xu da. she's a dude because the alternative is a peasant girl, and he makes his final stand as a peasant girl because fate is funny like that. zhu's gender is a giant gleeful raspberry blown at the world, while simultaneously being a vehicle for themes of gendered violence and discrimination and toxic masculinity and girlhood. i am so normal about this duology btw

[queereads-bracket]

Queer Adult SFF Books Bracket: Round 3

Book summaries below:

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone

Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandant finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading. Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future.

Except the discovery of their bond would mean death for each of them. There's still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win that war.

Science fiction, time travel, multiverse, epistolary, adult

The Radiant Emperor series (She Who Became the Sun, He Who Drowned the World) by Shelley Parker-Chan

In a famine-stricken village on a dusty yellow plain, two children are given two fates. A boy, greatness. A girl, nothingness…

In 1345, China lies under harsh Mongol rule. For the starving peasants of the Central Plains, greatness is something found only in stories. When the Zhu family’s eighth-born son, Zhu Chongba, is given a fate of greatness, everyone is mystified as to how it will come to pass. The fate of nothingness received by the family’s clever and capable second daughter, on the other hand, is only as expected.

When a bandit attack orphans the two children, though, it is Zhu Chongba who succumbs to despair and dies. Desperate to escape her own fated death, the girl uses her brother’s identity to enter a monastery as a young male novice. There, propelled by her burning desire to survive, Zhu learns she is capable of doing whatever it takes, no matter how callous, to stay hidden from her fate.

After her sanctuary is destroyed for supporting the rebellion against Mongol rule, Zhu takes the chance to claim another future her brother’s abandoned greatness.

Fantasy, historical fiction, alternate history, epic fantasy, series, adult

[3cosmicfrogs]

oh 12.65 litres of blood clinging to the outside of my body, we're really in it now

[a-place-to-burn]

i literally cannot stop thinking about wang baoxiang... the struggler of all time. love when the minister asks him if he has hobbies and hes like I Paint ♥️ and what he means is that hes obsessively making a poster to call some guy a cuck to destabilise the military power dynamics. girl thats not a hobby!! neither is Ending The World Because of Homophobia. he should be at the club 😭

[swordsonnet]

zhu and ouyang moodboard

[papenathys]

Designed a gay sex love square dynamic for my own sicko fantasies:

🔴 = red stands for narrative foils pining for each other, would share emotionally cathartic intimacy

🟢 = green stands for hostile passive aggressive sexual tension; gay sex would make it worse... but why not?

🔵 = blue stands for allies with benefits; gay sex to fill the void, but they are on relatively good terms with each other

[anarchistbitch]

happy pride month to my favourite misogynist <3 im glad u never had access to a podcast