#the fey alliance

[ahungeringknife]

365: June 23

TW: mentions of attempted sexual assault. Nothing happens but it is mentioned. Oh and also murder with a hammer.

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Standing silhouette in the alley Spayar had one of his smithing hammers raised. Relora stared up at him green eyes wide and met his own black ones which were wild in anger and then down at the mage's corpse draped across her lithe form. His skull had been bashed in all gore and gray matter that also dripped down from the head of Spayar's hammer.

"Are you alright?" the young smith asked her, winded from caving in the mage's skull.

"I... I think so," she said breathlessly. He leaned down and grabbed the corpse, throwing it against the alley wall. He didn't look as she fixed kalasiris, pulling it back down as she tried to get her wits about her. Then she looked at the corpse. "You just killed a royal mage," she said quietly, staring at the body clad in red.

"Good riddance," Spayar said and approached her, offering her a hand. She took it and he effortlessly pulled her to her feet. "Are you sure you're alright? Did that man hurt you?"

She stared up at him like he was insane. "Me? Spayar-- you just killed a royal mage," she whispered. Then fear shot through her. Spayar's family had a chance to move vertically in the castes because of him. And he'd just killed a royal mage. They'd find out. And that opportunity for him would go up in smoke. "Why did you do that?" she asked him frantically. And for her? She was nobody. She was no one. Untouchable. Unclean. Worse even that she was hexite. "You'll never break the ceiling now."

"That doesn't matter," Spayar said. "Did that man hurt you?" he asked again pointedly.

"What do you mean it doesn't matter? That's all that-

"Relora," he grabbed her by both arms and looked directly into her eyes. "You are what matters to me. Now did he hurt you?" he asked her in complete seriousness.

Relora blinked at him both understanding and not understanding at all. He... had feelings for her? Why? He was able to get reputation. Standing. She was nothing. He had a family, a home, food whenever he wanted, an elevating position within the castes. Relora slept under a bridge and that was always dangerous and was always trying to feed herself. Spayar was someone. She was just a bit of a human waste.

"He didn't hurt me," she said, voice shaking slightly.

"Don't lie to me if he did-

"He didn't!" she insisted. "Spayar... why?" she asked. She didn't understand. "You just threw away your family's advancement for an Untouchable." It was insane. It was just utterly insane. The last thing a reasonable person would do.

"Yes," he said seriously. "Because some things are more important than personal gain. Now let's get out of here."

"They'll find you."

"Then they will."

"They'll kill you," she said even as he pulled her out of the alley.

"They'll try," was all he said, stoically.

She grabbed his hand in both of hers. "Do you trust me?" she asked him.

"With everything," he said softly.

She was thinking of her friends. The disruptors. They didn't like being called a resistance or a rebellion. They were rebelling but they preferred to be called a disruption. Because that was what they were doing. Disrupting the Monarchy. Disrupting the rule of Rajas and the castes. Not that someone as low at Relora could do anything really. Maybe if she hadn't been an Untouchable her being a hexite would be more meaningful but even the Great Disruption wanted nothing with Untouchables.

Only this sweet young man did. And she would make sure he was safe.

"The mages and police will come, and they will find you," she said in a hoarse whisper. He didn't seem bothered. Which frightened her. He should be! "But I know some people who can help you."

"Help me how?"

"Keep you out of their hands. Do you trust me?" she asked him again.

"Always."

"I will go to them and tell them what happened. Heh. Keeping a mage safe from other mages, they'll see the irony," she said with a slightly strained smile. "Stay safe until I do."

"I will."

"Good," and she stood up on tip toe to kiss him on the cheek. If anyone knew she was an Untouchable and saw her do that to a man in the middle of the castes they'd stone her right then and there if not send for the police. Then she headed out. Or that was the plan. Spayar grabbed her arm, yanking her back. For a moment she thought maybe she'd over stepped, she'd mistaken his intention.

He kissed her briefly on the lips making her see sun spots. "I will be waiting then," he said and released her. She stared at him like she'd never seen him before, her face flushed hot but hidden under her dark skin. Then she darted off. She needed to find the disruptors quickly if she wanted to keep the police off Spayar.

[nemainofthewater]

Best character surnamed: Yang

Come and vote for the best characters with the same surname!*

What does best mean? It's up to you! Whether you love them, are intrigued by their characters, love to hate them, or they're your '2 second blorbos whose personality you made up wholesale', these are all reasons for you to vote for your favs!

*note, the surnames are not exactly the same in all the cases, as often there will be a different character. I am, however, grouping them all together otherwise things got more complicated.

Propaganda is very welcome! If I’ve forgotten anyone, let me know in the notes.

This is part of a larger series of ‘best character with X surname’ polls’. The overview with ongoing polls, winners, and future polls can be found here

EDIT: I made a mistake and Yang Zi is the actress from Lost You Forever, not the character! Apologies and thank you to @marlo-noni for flagging it

[equalseleventhirds]

fell asleep for a bit and woke up and am FERAL about binx actually and the revelations about her and like, the implications of her, right? surena was like ‘what if there’s someone who wants to break it’ about the game the rest of the archfey are playing and YEAH WHAT IF THO

like!! binx as an archfey with relatively little power!! ‘court of craft’ and i thought oh, craftiness sneakiness disguise whatever, but no she is MAKING things, and they are wondrous but she makes them with her hands bcos she’s used to having (maybe still has) very limited magical power

(the magic that other fey throw around like it’s nothing, and how it fucking galls, but how she has made it work, how she has managed to disguise what she does and make it look like she’s totally capable of throwing just as much magic around, bcos she’s so fucking good at her craft)

but she’s a warlock patron, which yes is work which the idle rich do not have to do, but that’s also a sharing of power? she gives magic to a mortal, to a being ignored and despised by other fey, which she herself has so little magic to give! mika asks for more spell slots and binx can’t, she has not more spell slots to give her, but she asks her to thank some wood and pull string from her clothes and binx helps her make an unseen servant to help her out, i am so 🥺🥺🥺

(i am wondering so much abt next episode and her saying she’ll look out for someone and brennan w/ the ‘are you a mortal’ bit, is binx helping out a mortal in the fey realm hhhhhhhhhhh)

but thennnnnn is warlock patroning like. an investment. u give a mortal some magic and that mortal grows stronger and then u can siphon off some power so u can give them more magic...... is that what that is, as a job, is that how fey like binx survive when their courts aren’t strong enough to be like the court of wonder.

is that what any of the rest of the courts have to look forward to if they lose their status? the lords of the wing have a threat of their own house weakening, is this the future their marriages would prevent?

as fun as the romance and drama of regency stuff is, all of that romance and drama and reputation and society is all a big delicate fancy rich-people game around... power. resources. after all, at the core of pride and prejudice is the inescapable fact that if they do not marry, the bennet girls will be destitute and homeless. they are lucky, to make love matches, but there is a fear beneath that. there are choices made.

and, under all the games and the wealth and the romance and the drama, we’re told at the top of episode one: the bloom is a manifestation of the feywild’s natural magical resources. the resources all of the characters, all of the courts rely on. the natural ebb and flow of magic, the bloom is the center of magic being high. being so very available for use (or overuse, or misuse) (and of course, mainly by those in power).

and rumor has it, this could be the last bloom............ ever.

[queen-caramilflinda]

Hobs kinda in the shit with everyone now huh?

Hob is trying to get the Lords of the Wing to lose their duel, trying to get Gwyn found out, was just challenged to a duel by Wuvvy who was backed up by Rue, and dueled Andhera (who admittedly tried to make amends at the end).

[gingerslapnotion]

see i think it would be really funny if what happened at the end there when lila was gearing up to go full revenge mode is that fei just showed up like "oh no you don't" and electrocuted her. the end

[simply-whump]

Mysterious Lotus Casebook (莲花楼) - Whump List

Whumpee : Li Lian Hua played by Cheng Yi, Fang Duo Bing played by Joseph Zeng and Di Fei Sheng played by Xiao Shun Yao

Synopsis : Ten years ago, Li Xiang Yi, the master of the Sigu Sect, dominated with his superior swordsmanship and was a symbol of light in the martial arts world. However, he suddenly disappeared along with Di Fei Sheng, the leader of the Jinyuan Alliance, after they arranged to battle in the East Sea. Ten years later, Li Lian Hua is a countryside doctor who travels dragging around a lotus tower. He accidentally becomes "famous" and gets pulled into the pugilistic world that he no longer wants to have any connections with. (MDL)

Genres : Mystery, Historical, Action

Warning! Possible spoilers below!

Li Lian Hua

Ep 1 : Fighting, cuts on his face and chest, veins appear on his arm, stabbed, spitting blood, eyes red, falls into the water — Slammed into a table

Ep 2 : Paralysed briefly — Choked

Ep 3 : Unwell, blue veins, treating himself — (Flashback) Stranded on a beach unconscious, wakes up, blaming himself for the death of many — Walking weakly, collapses, treated, bleeding from the mouth, told he lost almost all his power and is poisoned with no cure in sight, told he only has 10 years to live — (Present) Sword at his neck  — Locked up

Ep 4 : Hands tied — Chained, almost tortured, saved

Ep 5 : Hit by rocks, blood at his mouth, found, concern for him, passes out — Unconscious in bed, wakes up from a nightmare

Ep 6-7 : None

Ep 8 : Hit, holding his chest, spitting blood — Sword at his neck

Ep 9 : (Flashback) Crying — (Present) Grabbing his chest, concern for him — Fails to get up

Ep 10 : (Flashback) Has an allergy to peanuts, red spots on his neck — (Present) Pinned against a column, grabbed by the neck, grabbed a second time 

Ep 11 : Pushed, rolls down, hits a rock, falls into water, bruise on his neck

Ep 12 : Arm in a sling — Crying

Ep 13 : Paralysed — Kinda forced to drink some medicine, feeling uncomfortable, inner power given to him forcefully, blue veins on his neck and hands, in pain, spitting blood — Thrown into a pit full of snakes, bitten multiple times, groaning in pain — Spitting blood

Ep 14-17 : None

Ep 18 : Healing someone, using some power, sweating — Collapses, spitting blood —Coughing, concern for him, passes out — Unconscious in bed, concern for him — Walking unsteadily, vision blurry — Told he only has 4 months left to live — Crying — Has trouble getting up, given inner energy

Ep 19-24 : None

Ep 25 : Falls through a trap — Choked, almost stabbed, saved

EP 26 : Holding his chest, kidnaped — Thrown to the ground, surrounded by monsters — Found on the ground seemingly unconscious, concern for him, is fine, helped up

Ep 27 : Identity revealed to Fang Duobing, collapses, spitting blood, passes out — Wakes up, coughing — Walking unsteadily — Waking up in bed, coughing, told he was unconscious for 3 days — Coughing

Ep 28 : Hit, holding his chest

Ep 29 : None

Ep 30 : Arrested — Poison acting up, unwell, cold, curled up on himself, shivering, concern for him, wrapped in blankets — Wakes up in bed, vision blurry — Loses balance briefly — Blue veins on his neck, fighting, spitting blood, concern for him, in an explosion, helped up, attacked, thrown around, spitting blood, weak on the ground, vision blurry, protected — Unconscious, carried — Unconscious in bed, wakes up, concern for him, can’t get up, shaking, blue veins on his hands, coughing, told to lie down, cold, coughing up blood, passes out — Unconscious in bed, treated — Carried unconscious

Ep 31 : Wakes up — Crying — Coughing, refuses to be saved at the cost of someone else’s life

Ep 32 : Crying

Ep 33 : Crying, spitting blood, collapses to one knee, continues to fight even though the poison is acting up

Ep 34 : Crying — Red and blue veins on his wrist, concern for him

Ep 35 : None

Ep 36 : Captured, chained in prison, wrongful accused, frees himself

Ep 37 : Drops a cup, rubbing his eyes — Stabbed by someone he trusted, spitting blood, passes out — Missing — Prisoner, chained, unconscious — Wakes up, vision blurry, weak, coughing blood, blind

Ep 38 : Still chained, coughing — Choked, coughing — Regains sight, manages to free himself 

Ep 39 : Intense final battle, poison acting up — Learns a shocking truth, teary eyed

Ep 40 : Uses his internal power to save someone, coughing, sweating — Walking unsteadily, collapses to one knee, spitting blood, vision blurry, concern for him, passes out — Wakes up in bed, pulse taken — Spitting blood — Leaves (Dies? Lives? You decide)

Fang Duo Bing

Ep 1 : Drugged, dizzy, passes out 

Ep 2 : None

Ep 3 : Locked up

Ep 4 : Hands tied

Ep 5 : Drugged, passes out

Ep 6-7 : None

Ep 8 : Hit, spitting blood, passes out — Woken up

Ep 9-12 : None

Ep 13 : Hit, spitting blood, collapses to one knee, in pain — Suddenly passes out, unconscious in bed, treated

Ep 14 : Unwell, treated — “Poison” acting up again, in pain

Ep 15 : None

Ep 16 : Cured — Tied up (Comedic)

Ep 17-25 : None

Ep 26 : Has a headache, collapses — Fighting, arm cut, treated, bandaged

Ep 27 : Bombarded, fighting many enemies at once, shoulder cut, saved by Li Lianhua — Feeling betrayed, upset, crying

Ep 28-29 : None

Ep 30 : Drugged — Wakes up tied up with ropes, taken hostage, finally learns that Lianhua is gravely poisoned, grabbed by the neck, freed — Fighting a lot of people at once, injured, holding his side

Ep 31 : Coughing, bleeding from his previous injury, hiding it

Ep 32-34 : None

Ep 35 : Hit, falling through a deep hole, trapped

Ep 36 : Still trapped, fighting, hit, spitting blood

Ep 37-39 : None

Ep 40 : Crying, worried for Li Lianhua

Di Fei Sheng

Ep 1 : Fighting, stabbed in the shoulder, stabbed in the chest, falls into the water 

Ep 2-7 : None

Ep 8 : Poisoned 

Ep 7-12 : None

Ep 13 : Acupuncture performed on him

Ep 14-19 : None

Ep 20 : Stabbed in the stomach, poisoned — Unwell, bleeding, walking unsteadily, passes out, found in the water unconscious — Lost his memories, passes out — Unconscious in bed

Ep 21-24 : None

Ep 25 : Has a headache, poison spreading, treated

Ep 26 : Headache, groaning in pain, collapses

Ep 27 : Headache, poison acting up, stumbling, supported, sweating, cutting the palm of his hand with his sword, cured, passes out — Wakes up in bed, regained his memories but pretends he has not

Ep 28-33 : None

Ep 34 : Poisoned, attacked, bleeding from the mouth, stabbed, both wrists and ankles slashed (tendons broken), bleeding, collapses, bleeding from the mouth — Weak

Ep 35-37 : None

Ep 38 : Prisoner, chained in water, injured, wound touched, wincing, stabbed, spits blood (in the villain face, which was kinda nice), slapped — Freed, carried — Meditating to heal himself, bleeding from the mouth, helped — Trapped

Ep 39-40 : None

>> More Whump List

[bbcphile]

Thoughts on character and costume?

I really love how the respective characters have different colour palettes, silhouettes but in particular material/textures to their costuming. Fang Duobing is a little princess so he gets pale pastels, fancy ornamentation and transparent gauzy fabrics which I find so cute, he’s not just rich he’s *expensive* and *pretty* it’s pretty funny that he matches the actual princess in the red leaves mountain case

DFS gets your wide shoulder bad guy rich deep colours with thick layers and lots of metal detailing but it veers towards grand instead of pretty. Hot topic young DFS is leather and studs lmao. Brocade and fur & shit.

LLH is a linen boi and he almost never has any metal on him, we all know his natural material hair ornament meta etc. Interestingly, he does share some colour palette and fabric overlap with FDB, we se him with his tits out transparent outer layer sometimes. No structure all flowy silhouette

someone on here made a post abt their differing sleeve styles but I can’t find it!

I wanted to gush but also do u have any extra costume thoughts + how they relate to one another? You have a great knack for finding good photos of the show too 😅

Thanks for the ask, @lei-llustrations , and I love your analysis of the outfits! I'm so sorry it took me forever to respond! I had grand plans for a full essay analyzing DFS's costumes, and then I ran out of spoons for doing that. (The short version of the point I was going to prove is that his a-Fei outfits have elements of what seem to be his favorite details from his fancier alliance leader outfits, so it seemed like evidence of LLH trying to make up for making him be in disguise and without his power. I'm thinking of the maroon-red one with studs in the sleeves in particular, but there are echoes of his preferences in the other ones, too.)

Since I'll never actually respond if I wait to put that meta together, here's a shorter one, with my thoughts on DFS's official Alliance Leader robes (screenshot taken from ep 40, when delivering the wangchuan flower).

LLH and FDB both call him Di mengzhu in the wangchuan flower scene, because he's clearly dressed in a way that makes this an Official Visit. I find it fascinating that he wears his alliance leader outfit instead of his grey, maroon, and gold outfit that he wears for non-alliance matters (aka. the wedding room outfit, which he also wears for such Xiangyi-related purposes as the reunion duel that doesn't happen and grieving for him in the middle of the night). After all, he's giving LLH a gift to save his life and issuing him a friendly anniversary honeymoon challenge, so you'd think that would call for his dating outfit, not his official garb.

BUT! What if he's using his official Alliance Leader regalia as a way of saying that not only a-Fei/Lao Di, but also Di Mengzhu and the Jinyuan Alliance want him to live? It's more than just essentially creating Peace Treaty version 2.0, and trying to get life back to what could have been if SGD and JLQ hadn't ruined everything: their people at peace, and the two of them meeting for friendly duels rather than death matches. Yes, only LLH and FDB are there to witness it, but by showing up in his Official Capacity, he's also correcting all the narratives about the enmity between himself and Li Xiangyi, and in giving him the flower, he's officially declaring that Di Mengzhu wants Li Lianhua to heal and have his strength and power back more than he wants to gain martial arts power himself.

This is a HUGE deal. DFS formed the Jinyuan Alliance as a way of climbing the ranks of the jianghu, because his goal was to gain strength so he'd never be helpless or forced to do someone's bidding again. And yet, he wears the outfit that symbolizes that striving and his place at the top of it to GIVE AWAY THE FLOWER THAT WOULD CEMENT HIS PLACE AT THE TOP OF THE JIANGHU. He wants Li Lianhua to not just live but also to regain the strength SGD and JLQ stole from him, which would mean that Li Xiangyi would quite possibly defeat him, and he would welcome that, because it's not about self-protection anymore: now, what he wants more than anything else, is for Li Xiangyi/Lianhua to live.

If that's not enough of an emotional gut punch, try this: Di Feisheng told Li Xiangyi at the start of the show that swordsmen shouldn't have weaknesses. Di Feisheng has only really had two "weaknesses" (vulnerabilities might be more accurate): his desiring the wangchuan flower (which led to SGD and JLQ incapacitating him) and Li Lianhua. It feels like a monumental shift to me that, at the end of the show, Di Feisheng hands one weakness to the man who is the other: essentially, he is announcing to the world that nothing is more important to him than Li Lianhua's recovery, and he doesn't care who knows it.

It also feels very pertinent that his official outfit is wedding red, and he's essentially showing up in his fanciest remaining outfit to offer Li Lianhua his heart on a platter priceless magical flower in a box the way someone might show up at the house of their beloved with boxes and boxes of betrothal gifts. Not that DFS explained that or LLH picked up on it, because that would involve better communication skills than either of them had.

[utilitycaster]

This will possibly skew my poll (although you are encouraged to vote how you want and argue for other things - I would love thoughtful meta on Ludinus's true origins and this is still, ultimately, speculative) but I am really enamored with the idea that he is from the group of elves in northern Wildemount who beseeched Corellon for aid, but were not answered - not because they were ignoring them, but because they had been deafened in battle with Gruumsh. Those elves then attempted to encase their civilization in ice and fled to the Feywild, returning afterwards to rebuild, as the ice didn't work.

This has so many elements that not only fit Ludinus's story, but allow for interesting hooks into other Calamity-era occurrences. If you take the story straight (and then have him get separated from the others in some capacity at any point following not getting an answer from Corellon), this all comes down to Ludinus perceiving an inadvertent absence as a betrayal, setting up the tragedy of dedicating his life to destroying the world, all over a misunderstanding. Sure, Molaesmyr is also the hub of elven culture and few will question his presence, but his willingness to go against the priests of the Arch Heart and to destroy feels much more targeted if it's not a flailing strike at all the gods, but rather vengeance on Corellon's ground.

You also set up where he may have gotten the idea to feed on fey energy and the knowledge to do so effectively; this even could set up how he was able to develop an alliance with the Unseelie Court. The timeline is loose enough - the Veluthil burns for a century post-Calamity - that we don't know what else he might have done. There's a chance for him to return to the Material Plane and work with the original Cerberus Assembly, or to have been the one to have set the arcane fire in the region in the first place. I also think the idea of Ludinus as a terrestrial-based wizard in the era of flying cities makes sense both in that he'd know of Aeor and perhaps even envy it, but be unfamiliar with the details of their tech and therefore preserving the idea that he is painstakingly and cleverly reverse-engineering this tech rather than just badly returning to what he already knew.

Finally: it explains a lot about his base of operations. Why not establish himself in Marquet? Why On some level, he remains in northern Wildemount because that is his home. Maybe he really was in Ivaadel for a time, but this is where he's from, changed as it is. The Dwendalian Empire is a useful tool, and the Cerberus Assembly's new incarnation a seized opportunity, but he could have originally been from where Rexxentrum now stands.

If any of this is the case, and that's a big if, I do wonder if he knows why Corellon didn't answer; or if he ever will.

[herbgerblin]

ID: First Image is of various character from A court of Fey and Flowers. From left to right is Delloso de la Rue, a tall, olive green owlbear. They are wearing a pearl headpiece and rose-pink regency gown with red ribbon and pearl accents on the shoulders. Rue looks very calm and poised externally, but an internal depiction shows them looking very flustered while thinking, "His hand is so close!" On their chest rest Binx, disguised as a tiny golden frog. Binx is reaching out to shake hands with Captain K. P. Hob, a tall bugbear. He has light brown fur and yellow eyes, and is wearing a dark blue captain's coat over a white vest. His attention is very much on Binx. Behind Hob is Prince Andhera, a short, masculine-presenting fey. Anhera is wearing a dark rob lined with gold. A small, pink, throbbing raincloud looms over his head as he looks up at his friends with confusion. The second image is of two more drawings of Rue. On the left, Rue is holding their large, dark, clawed hands in supplication as they say, "I pray, protect yourself." On the right is a full body sketch of Rue, wearing a bright yellow regency gown, yellow flowers on their head, and two gold necklaces. End ID

forming alliances in the tailor shop my beloved

[kingsandbastardz]

I've reached episode 25 of Mysterious Lotus Casebook and current thoughts and questions:

Amnesia a-Fei is fantastic because his personality stays the same except being less restrained with his facial expressions.

His sense of humor (comic timing on the mountain is A++) and style of wandering in and out of the scene bearing unexpected "gifts", digging his heels in when he doesn't want to do something, and attacking full force when the group is in danger -- it reminds me of a very large house cat

Are they implying that his lack of taste is psychological? Since he's able to taste food with his memories wiped. That means he lost his sense of taste as an adult, right? I wonder if it was gradual or a triggered event...

One scene i found particularly interesting: Li Lianhua asks a-Fei about his past history and a-Fei truthfully tells him that he remembers killing a lot. And that he came from "a mountain of corpses" with an almost-smiling and completely pleasant expression on his face. Li Lianhua changes the topic immediately without blinking or reacting. I'm split between whether he realizes it's a heavy topic and he personally doesn't want to know? Or if maybe he realizes that a-Fei was using a style of phrasing I like to call "shock and awe conversation stoppers" You know when you drop a bomb into a conversation you want to end with a banger like "They split my ribcage open with giant forceps while I was still half awake. It sucked." *pregnant pause, pleasant smile* So being sensitive to that, he prioritizes moving the conversation to something more comfortable?

I like how Fang Doubing is seriously cute but in a quietly burly-bro-potentially-strong way (which is especially reinforced with his style of stomping ppl into the ground during fights). Li Lianhua is also similarly deceptive where his fighting style and physical build is delicate but he's actually deeply imposing and overbearing when active (verbally or physically). Which is interesting because I find it's the opposite with Di Feisheng. Di Feisheng is super imposing on the surface and ok about 10 feet near that surface? But put him in the right conditions (like around the other two guys) and all the softness comes out. It's just the softness has natural claws like a feral cat or a snake or something. I mean, when you're a strong as he is, softness is relative. So in the case when he was fighting at the wedding party, he felt actually... gentle, to me? Despite wiping the floor with everyone. From the sect's perspective he was viciously attacking, but he didn't strike me as even being seriously upset at getting trapped in the array. It was like... I'm here's an analogy - you know when zoos give giant cardboard boxes to a lion? And it plays with it but cardboard doesn't stand a chance so it'll be crushed pretty quickly under its weight and butt just from the act of playing. I feel like in a lot of fights, Di Feisheng actually modulates his force a lot more than his reputation suggests. It's just he's THAT fucking strong.

Side note: this also explains why Li Lianhua used to think the sect couldn't do without him. I mean if he was the only one strong enough to go against an enemy that his ppl couldn't fight even as a group...

Lol what was it 7 vs 1 and Di Feisheng still wiped the floor with the entire sect leadership in the cherry blossom security trap

Li Lianhua attracts all the single ladies looool (and lads)

The alliance guy that does Di Feisheng's errands is cute. And loyal, which makes him more cute. Does he have a name at all?

Li Lianhua's smiles any time DFS does whatever is great. Oh he's wandering the mountain side and this widget gave him sensory issues so he yanked it out and brought it back in his own volition (like a cat with a corpse) ? That whole episode Li Lianhua was dropping secret smile bombs even more than when DFS folded himself into a 6yr old body

I want to see DFS as a 6 yr old again. Deliberately for a case.

[ahungeringknife]

365: June 22

Woops Relora that's what you get promising your son to a trickster god :)

--------

Coming out of her daughter's room Relora paused hearing voices in her son's room. It was late. Spayar should have been asleep. She leaned close and heard Spayar's small voice and also heard another boy's voice. Spayar wasn't having any sleepovers tonight.

She opened the door and saw Spayar sitting up in his little bed. "Mazuk, you should be asleep," she said even as her sea glass green eyes darted all around the room looking for the source of the other voice. But the tiny room was empty.

"I was trying to amma," Spayar said.

"Trying?" she asked, standing in the doorway still, dim light from the hallway spilling around her into the cramped room.

"My friend Fen was telling me a story."

"... Fen? Who's Fen?" she asked casually. She didn't know any of Spayar's friends named Fen. It wasn't even a Feylian name or a name from Dirin which were his other friends.

"He's my friend," was all Spayar said.

Relora looked around the small room again, "Was he in here?"

"Mhm!"

"Is he still in here?" she asked nervously.

"Yeah but he's waiting for you to go away to finish the story," Spayar said like it was the most normal thing in the world. All the hair rose on Relora's neck.

"Oh really?" she kept her voice steady. "I wish I could see your friend too," she said like she wasn't casting a very serious bit of magic.

She was as surprised as the being that appeared on her son's bed when he did appear. Relora felt all the blood rush out of her face seeing the being. Sevok. The crocodile god. The liar. The trickster. He was sitting on Spayar's bed as a preteen, much older than Spayar who was only about four. Sevok was a beautiful dark skinned boy from the Dirin lowlands with mischievous gold and silver eyes wearing a formal service coat with long sleeves covered in golden embroidery, his own brown hands replaced by golden ones. He'd cut the golden stitching on his mouth so he could open his mouth and his son didn't seem to find that terrifying.

Sevok looked as shocked that had worked as Relora did. "Get out of my house," she said, voice stilted and terrified.

"Oh don't be like that Relora-

"Get out of my house before I call someone who will do something about you," she said, heart hammering so hard it was about to erupt out of her chest.

"You wouldn't do that-

"Cross me, crocodile," she finally stepped into the room. "Your fathers will love you know you misbehave," and like she was dealing with some of Spayar's older friends she grabbed Sevok by the ear and twisted it. The god shouted and jumped to his feet as she lifted him off the bed by the ear.

"That's not nice," Sevok said, staring up at her, tears in the corner of his eyes. "We had a deal."

"You will collect later," she hissed. "Now get out of my house or I will call someone to see your misbehavior and your fathers will punish you more for meddling with mortals."

Sevok looked at her with a frown. "I wasn't going to hurt him," and then he turned into haze and was gone. Once he was Relora sagged, her heart thundering so hard it was covering the ringing in her ears.

"Amma? Am I in trouble?" Spayar asked her, his black eyes huge and worried.

"No," she assured him quickly. "No no. Never mazuk," and she went and hugged her little son. She pulled him into her arms as she stood again.

"Fen was just telling me a story," he sniffed like he was going to cry.

"Lets not worry about Fen," she said, smoothing his hair more to reassure herself than him.

"Is Fen bad?"

"He's... not bad but he's not good either," Relora said. Spayar just frowned at her, not understanding. "Do you want to sleep with me and dooim?" she asked.

That perked him yes. "Yes," he said nodding.

"Okay," and she kissed him on the forehead and took him out of his room to the last room in their little apartment. Spayar was already in bed when she arrived with their son.

"What's this?" Spayar asked in his deep velvety voice.

"He's sleeping with us tonight," she said and got into bed with her husband.

"Oh yeah? How come?" Spayar asked, curious but not upset.

"Amma didn't like Fen," their son said.

Spayar frowned. "I've told you, junior, Fen's not real. He's just your imaginary friend," he said.

"But amma saw him. Right amma?"

Relora looked at Spayar, wide eyed. She'd seen it. He saw that in her eyes but they both knew whatever it was Spayar was seeing they needed to help him not. But she couldn't ignore the fact that Sevok had been in their home! A god in their home! Telling their toddler stories in the dark! "I don't know what I saw," she said, swallowing.

"It was Fen! He's really nice. He's always got the best stories," their son said cheerfully.

Spayar gave Relora a look of concern. "Let's just go to sleep," she said. "Tomorrow will be the answer to tonight's questions." A Dirin saying but also her telling Spayar she'd tell him in the morning.

"Lucky me. Get to spend the night with two of my favorite people," Spayar said. "My beautiful Relora," and he leaned across their son to kiss Relora gently and it went a long way to reassure her it'd be alright even if Spayar didn't know what was wrong. "And my best little guy," Spayar leaned down to kiss their son all over the face making him giggle and hug Spayar. Spayar wrapped one of his great dark arms around their son and laid down.

Relora went to turn down the lights before joining them in bed. Their son was cuddled against Spayar's wide chest contently already. Relora just reached over to take Spayar's hand in the dark. He grabbed it back and squeezed it. They'd figure it out in the morning.

[difeisheng]

feeling distraught tonight about how content a-fei seemed following li lianhua and fang duobing around. recovering his memory was always something that was going to happen eventually, but aside from asking for details about himself and his life when he woke up, a-fei never seemed in a huge rush to know about the past. he pressed li lianhua for secrets, but it was almost always in an exchange he held up his fair end of. like it was a game, or a back and forth routine of their relationship instead of working toward solving the puzzle of his identity. even curing him in the end was less about a-fei remembering and more just getting the worsening wuxin huai out of him. if that hadn't happened, i wonder how long he would've just wandered at li lianhua's side, doing what he asked and protecting him when needed, despite already knowing he had the jinyuan alliance looking for him. how badly did a-fei not want the illusion of this life to break?

[dangermousie]

In support of Hot General Summer (tm)

I realized that my recent poll not only lacked visual support but also left out a lot of my fave cdrama generals. So, in support of my Hot General Summer agenda:

Xiao Qi, Rebel Princess

Wei Wu Ji, Sound of the Desert

Ling Buyi, Love Like the Galaxy

Zhousheng Chen, One and Only

Zhao Yun, God of War Zhao Yun

Sima Yi, Secret of Three Kingdoms

Han De Rang, The Legend of Xiao Chuo

Zhan Beiye, Legend of Fuyao

Gao Chang Gong, Lan Ling Wang

Xiang Yu, Story of Han Dynasty

Cao Pi, The Advisors’ Alliance

Meng Tiang Fang, Ancient Terracotta War Situation

Chu Bei Jie, General and I

Zhu Zan, Jin Jiu Ling

Wolfie, The Wolf

Xiang Yu, Legend of Chu and Han

Cheng Yi, The Promise of Chang’an

Liu Xiu, Singing All Along

Huo Xin, Painted Skin the Resurrection

Meng Qi You, Glamorous Imperial Concubine

Yang Bros, The Young Warriors

Weng Gui, Princess Jieyou

Xiao Ping Zhang, Nirvana in Fire 2

Pei Zhao, Maiden Holmes

Ji Ye, Novoland Eagle Flag

Zhu Qi Zhen, Imperial Doctress (it’s a reach he’s an emperor. But he leads his force in battle and I wanted Wallace Huo there so...)

Yuan Ling, Lost Love in Times

Yi Xiao Chuan, The Myth

Gu Tingye, The Story of Ming Lan

Lu Bu, Three Kingdoms 2010

Xu Lingyi, The Sword and the Brocade

Yue Fei, Patriot Yue Fei

Xiang Yu, The Myth

Ping Zhang, Nirvana in Fire 2

Guo Jing, Legend of Condor Heroes 2008

Xiang Yu, The Legend of Qin

[the-wintry-mizzenmast]

笛花 Dihua/Feihua prompt fill for @magicknightriderjellyfish02 Still riding that burst of inspiration in the groupchat from @lyselkatz's post-canon fanart of silver-haired Li Lianhua and bearded A-Fei.

[How the beard thing became permanent part of their life and llh's reaction towards it, esp when they are intimate with each other]

-----

“That tickles!” giggled Li Lianhua the first time that Di Feisheng scraped the unshaven stubble of his chin across the smooth surface of his husband’s thigh. 

He would have shaved earlier in the morning had it not been for Li Lianhua’s imperious demand that he come back to bed, and between those vigorous morning activities and everything else they’d done during the day, Di Feisheng had simply forgotten. From the way that Li Lianhua’s cock swelled in response to the new texture, it did not seem that it was unwelcome. So Di Feisheng rubbed his chin and jaw once more against his husband’s skin, before taking him into his mouth. 

“Growing your beard out, hm?” asked Li Lianhua the next day during breakfast, noting that his husband had eschewed shaving again. 

“Is that going to be a problem?” 

Li Lianhua reached out a hand, rubbing a thumb across his chin. “No,” he replied, the sunlight glinting off his silver hair lending his smirk a particularly mesmerizing glow. 

Di Feisheng leaned into his husband’s caress, turned his head to kiss his palm, and then breakfast was soon forgotten. 

Two weeks later, Fang Duobing positively yelped the moment he stepped past the threshold of Lotus Tower. 

“What is that thing on Lao Di’s face?”

“A beard,” Di Feisheng replied. “You’d know what it was if you could grow one.”

Fang Duobing made a strangled noise of protest and took a threatening step forward, forcing Li Lianhua to intervene. 

“You can’t possibly like that,” Fang Duobing accused, pointing at Di Feisheng’s face over Li Lianhua’s body, which was positioned squarely between the two of them. 

“Actually, I like how it feels,” said Li Lianhua with a saucy grin. 

Fang Duobing made a small noise of revulsion as the images of what the old fox meant rose unbidden in his mind. 

“It lends him quite a distinguished air, don’t you think?” 

“He looks like my father.”

“Which one?”

“Both.”

And then Li Lianhua had to try a lot harder to keep his husband and his disciple apart, lest another wall in Lotus Tower collapse in the ensuing scuffle. 

It was late into the night, after Fang Duobing had fallen asleep upstairs, his breaths becoming quiet and regular, before Li Lianhua clamped both hands around his husband’s face, and drew it down for a kiss. 

It was a long time before Di Feisheng was allowed to pull away enough to speak. “If I’d known you’d like it this much I would have grown it out ages ago.”

Li Lianhua smiled and shook his head. “You’ve changed, A-Fei,” he said softly. “I’ve changed too,” he added, holding up a lock of his own silver-white hair for emphasis, the result of the dissolution of the Bicha poison. “I don’t think it would have fit you then, as Jinyuan Alliance Chief, but now? Anonymous Jianghu Wandering Uncle? I think it looks perfect.”

“Anonymous Jianghu Wandering Uncle?”

“Xiaobao’s not entirely wrong about the look.”

Di Feisheng growled, his expression darkening. “Come here, you.”

Li Lianhua laughed, gave his husband’s goatee a tug, and then melted into his arms. 

[theresattrpgforthat]

Is there any rpg where you play as the arch-magus of a castle, and the focus of the game are the politics involved in the whole thing? Like, I certainly CAN cast a fog spell to help you in the upcoming battle, but what am *I* getting out of it?

Theme: Magic and Politics

Hello friend. What I’m understanding that you’re looking for is games in which magic exists, but the point of using it is as a political tool, rather than for effective damage. I found a few games that might be in the ballpark of what you’re looking for, but if you want to look at mechanics that do something similar, I’d definitely recommend checking out the Debt system that exists in Urban Shadows 1e. That’s a game all about doing things for favours, and there’s even a Wizard playbook!

Hearts of Magic, by fading roots.

Fey nobility, arcanist-bureaucrats, and anarchist witches falling for their enemies and getting into messy entanglements amid an undeclared war for control of a magepunk city newly inundated with magical energy.

Play as the Lords and Ladies, the fey noble families of the city, using the fey magic of promises, prophecies, and glamours; The Order, using the arcane techniques of ritual,  patterns, and the careful and esoteric arrangement of mundane items; or The Witches, teaching The City to channel raw magic and weave powerful spells.

The object of the game is to create messy entanglements. Fall in love with your enemies, ally with your rivals, fight with your friends. Players will create characters, establish their situations in solitaire scenes, and build scenes using the ten included games. Rules are lightweight and simple, and give you all the tools you need to establish and play scenes, even if improvising dialogue is not your strongest skill.

This game is more about the relationships between the characters than the magic itself; the magic is just the means of navigating those relationships. Hearts of Magic is built from Firebrands, which means that you will play a series of mini games in an order that makes the most sense for your characters, to figure out what happens to them. From the overview of the different mini games it looks like your relationships could be flirtatious or fraught with rivalry; how it plays out it up to you.

Interregnum, by vortiwife.

Interregnum is a playing card-based tabletop game of ambition and ruin set against a backdrop of backstabbing and corporate intrigue.  As the Inheritors to a vast Empire, the players must navigate a world of cutthroat politics, forge temporary alliances with their power-hungry rivals, and attempt to destroy those same rivals before they get the idea first.

Sell your soul in a doomed bid for power. Shake hands with your rivals while plotting their demise.

Magic doesn’t seem to be a necessary part of this game, but you can certainly include it if you want to. Interregnum is setting-agnostic: the rules use playing cards and concepts familiar to Blackjack to help you determine how your characters jockey for power. Over the course of the game you will create alliances and incur ruin, falling from grace and making deals with your Empire’s biggest threat just so that you can try and stay in the game. This can be humorous or cutthroat, so make sure that if you pick this game up, you agree as a table on the kind of game you want to play.

Come With A Price, by Blue Maelstrom.

Thinking of the final pleas of his dearest friend, the metal man holds out a gleaming purple crystal, gazing expectantly at the wooden heap. Thinking of her family’s pox-ridden faces, the child lifts her gnarled wooden wand, an identical copy of the one her grandparent had once wielded. Thinking of the lord who took everything from her, the brunette raises her crimson dagger to the heavens. Three words are said, and the inert wood instantly bursts into fiery life, an inferno of brilliant blue lapping against the robes of the assembled coven. The First Deal has been made.

Come With A Price is a rules light tabletop roleplaying game, in which you and your friends join together to craft the story of a coven of witches setting out to make their wildest dreams come true. Together, these witches harness nearly unlimited magical power in order to accomplish feats beyond mortal understanding. Magic demands sacrifice, however, and sometimes deals must be struck so that a witch can get what they want. Making bargains, doing the impossible, and reshaping the world: that is the life of a witch.

While this game is flexible in terms of setting and genre, it maintains that regardless of where your story takes place, magic comes at a price. During character creation, as you make your witches, you’ll brainstorm some kind of scenario that interests your characters. All of your witches will approach this scenario with their own goals; whether or not your character will complete their goal will be determined in play.

The interesting bit that might interest you is the fact that the witches can make deals with other witches to cast the spell for them. When this happens, the spellcaster doesn’t suffer nearly as much from the magic, and the witch who made the deal has to give the spell caster something in return for doing the magic. You’ll likely find yourselves making plenty of deals so as to reduce the toll magic makes on each of your characters - of course, if your witches all have opposing goals, they’ll have to be clever about the deals they make! If you want to hack this game to make it about wizards or magi instead, you probably don’t need to change much.

[eirenical]

Mysterious Lotus Casebook | Lian Hua Lou | 莲花楼 | Episode 13

"Li Xiangyi wasn't always right. I'm older than you. I've heard a lot about him. When he was young, he was very petulant. The downfall of the Sigu Sect was partly his fault." -Li Lianhua on Li Xiangyi, Mysterious Lotus Casebook Episode 19

[Do not repost. Do not remove caption. Thank you!]

Bonus:

You know the drill (or maybe you don't if you're new? *waves*)… all my thoughts and images descriptions behind the cut:

[Above the text are five gifs depicting a mildly heated conversation between Li LIanhua and Fang Duobing from episode 13 of Mysterious Lotus Casebook. Li Lianhua has just revealed that "A-Fei" is Di Feisheng, the leader of the Jinyuan Alliance. Fang Duobing is upset and demands to know what Li Lianhua could have to do with him. Li Lianhua explains that Di Feisheng wants him to save someone, but that Li Lianhua doesn't want to save this person. Fang Duobing goes on to say that Li Lianhua shouldn't save this person, because he must be a bad person if Di Feisheng wants him saved. Li Lianhua agrees that this person is a bad person and that he won't save him, that it's more important to save Fang Duobing now. Bonus gifs show Fang Duobing protesting that he is talented and might have felt a bit funny before but he's fine now... and then promptly passes out. Li Lianhua rushes to his side.]

First of all, the entirely of episode 13 drove me completely feral in so many ways I still can't put it concisely into words. But the core of it sits right here in this exchange. There is so much evidence in the first 12 episodes that Li Lianhua doesn't really care if he lives or dies or, at the very least, that he's resigned himself to dying, but this is the first time we see him say outright that not only doesn't he care if he dies, but that he, in fact, WANTS to die.

"He asked me to promise him to save someone. [...] There are people in this world who can only be saved by me. Unfortunately, I don't want to save them."

After this episode, we know that there is only one person that Di Feisheng wants to save. And that's Li Xiangyi. And here he is admitting out loud that he doesn't want to be saved. That he wants to die. And moments later, he agrees with Fang Duobing that this person Di Feisheng wants saved is a bad person. That he is a bad person. And you can see it in his face that he wholeheartedly believes it. He's said as much before. Every time he talks to Fang Duobing about Li Xiangyi, he paints him in the worst light possible. Everyone else gets the benefit of the doubt in his stories, except himself.

His self esteem is in the toilet, he blames himself for most of the things that went wrong 10 years ago, and he actively wants to die.

And that paints Di Feisheng's desperate need to save his life and Fang Duobing's equally desperate need to save Li Xiangyi's character and legacy in such a poignant light. They both want to save him in their own ways, but Li Lianhua is right: the only person who CAN save him is himself. Because without that will to live, without that willingness to forgive himself, then no matter what either of them does, he isn't going to go along with it.

But the thing that really truly breaks me in all this is that IT STARTS TO WORK.

Just a few episodes after this, Di Feisheng steps in to save his secret identity, all but begging Li Lianhua to let him help, and Li Lianhua AGREES. And in the aftermath, when he's suffering, Di Feisheng steps in to feed him spiritual energy to heal him in whatever small way he can against the poison and Li Lianhua allows that, too. And you can see in so many of these little ways that his attitude is starting to shift, just a little. That maybe he's starting to entertain the idea that he could live. Because Di Feishing has enough will to live for both of them and he's not afraid to keep applying it like a baseball bad against Li Lianhua's suicidal ideation.

And then we have Fang Duobing. The quote below the gifset is from episode 19, and once again we have Li Lianhua tearing down Li XIangyi's character. But Fang Duobing isn't going to stand for that.

FDB: Someone said that to me before, but I've studied him. He should be proud of himself! LLH: There's a fine line between proud and arrogant. "Arrogant" is not a good word. FDB: He was proud because he had faith. Faith is a great word. No one is perfect. Neither was he. There are shadows wherever there is light. Yes. Maybe Li Xiangyi was too proud. But he established the Sigu Sect to make the jianghu a better place where the strong didn't prey on the weak. Look at those guys. They're just a bunch of selfish posers! LLH: If Li Xiangyi knew that someone could understand him so well ten years later, he'd be very glad.

He ALSO has enough faith for both of them. Li Xiangyi would be very glad... and Li Lianhua is very glad. You can see him in that moment, testing his weight against the possibility that maybe, just maybe, even though he wasn't perfect, he wasn't as bad as he believed himself to be. Maybe there was some good in him. Maybe it wasn't all in vain. Maybe he does deserve at least a little forgiveness.

And that push and pull between Di Feisheng and Fang Duobing should, by all rights, be acting like a tug of war to pull Li Lianhua apart. But it doesn't. It's pulling them all forward. Towards healing. Especially Li Lianhua. And he's not there yet. It's still going to take time. But the seeds of it are being planted. And we have so many more episodes still to go and I have no doubt things will go pear-shaped at some point, but to go from this *points up at gifset* to tentative healing in a matter of 6 episodes? That's huge. And I'm so happy he has them both. TT^TT