#the hulijing emperor

[ssuminshan-official]

Party in Jinlintai!!! Part 1.

Emperor of peacock spirits, and the peacock spirit Dianxia enters!!!

Xue yang: oh no not another diva.

Su she: there's no such thing as a diva diet.

Mo xuanyu: Xuan gege once made a diva diet. It composes of salads, fruits that were only grown in his imperial orchid. Green tea and lemon water.

Vegan fish.

Yao: I did it once, and it did wonders for my skin. Zish is such a genius. If he wasn't an emperor, he would be a dietician or a beauty influencer.

Mo xuanyu: I would too, Yao gege.

Yao: of course!!

Xue yang: you two would be beauty blenders.

Su she: you're always flawless!

Xue yang: this Xuan Huangdi is such a diva.

Zixuan: *enters with Jinling*

Yao: Zishie! A-ling!

Zixuan: *hugs* foxy!

How are you?!

Yao: ah contented for the while.

Zixuan: aww.

Let me serve you some tea, foxy.

Yao: mn.

Jinling: xiao shushu, your place is so nice! Better than Jinlintai by far.

Yao: *pinches cheeks* aw thank you, A-Ling.

A-Ling. I bought some beautiful gifts for you, since I knew that you were coming. *claps twice*

Attendants: *holding gifts* Rulan Dianxia, we'll put it in your caravan for you.

Yao: heyy. Call him Ling Dianxia. He doesn't like the name Rulan.

Yes Huangdi.

Jinling: I love your gifts, Xiao shushu! Thank you very much!

Huaisang: *sweeping* this San ge keep pampering everyone. Hmpf!

Jinling: wow! Xiao shushu! Is that a crossbow?!!

Yao: triple crossbow.

Jinling: you're the best!!

And what's in this pouch?

Yao: just a small allowance of $250,000

Jinling: awww.

Zixuan: how amazing.

See, your Xiao shushu loves you a lot.

Yao: mhm.

Mo xuanyu: A-Ling. I got you some new clothes!

Jinling: aw thank you so much, xiao ershu.

Mo xuanyu: no problem darling.

Zixuan: Yaoyao, anything new?

Yao: a collection of Jade ornaments! See

Zixuan: aww, they're beautiful.

You're the cutest thing, Yaoyao. *grabs hands affectionately*

Huaisang: the most annoying thing too.

Zixuan: would you mind. I'm talking to foxy.

Huaisang: *glaring*

Zixuan: can you sweep somewhere else?

Huaisang: *sighs* yes Huangdi.

Jinling: how is Nie qianbe working for you now?

Yao: sometimes I really don't know, lol.

But he gets the job done, sometimes.

Zixuan: he looks lovely like this.

Xue yang: *plucks some of Zixuan's peacock feathers*

Zixuan: ouch! Xue yang!

Yao: Chengmei.

Mo xuanyu: *gasps*

Xue yang: *plucks*

Su she: oh no.

Zixuan: my feathers are off limits!

Yao: behave Chengmei. You'll hurt him.

Xue yang: Jiggy I was bored. And I wanted to get some work for Huaisang

Su she: team dimple supervises huaisang, so that he doesn't stress out Huangdi.

Zixuan: awww.

Huaisang: when do I stress out San ge?!!

Zixuan and Yao: you always do.

Su she: 24/7

Mo xuanyu: 365.

Zixuan: Huaisang, there's a divine peacock feather mess on the floor.

Huaisang: divine?

Zixuan: because I'm Huangdi.

Use a golden platter and rest it over there. It's not any other peacock feather.

Huaisang: why should I do that?! Can't you see I'm sweeping.

Zixuan: I can arrest you.

Huaisang: right away huangdi.

Zixuan: handle them with care.

Rusong: *entering* Ling gege!

Jinling: Rusong! *highfives*

Rusong: where have you been, gege.

Jinling: night hunting, and then I'm in Yunmeng with Jiujiu.

Rusong: ohh. Here I have been busy being Dianxia.

Jinling: so you juggle it like me?

Rusong: yup, cultivation and being the hulijing Dianxia.

Yao: how cute.

Zixuan: they get along so well.

Yao: yess! and they're the most handsome Dianxias in the Jianghu. Why don't they go on a vacation.

Rusong: sounds great, A-Die!

Jinling: I was thinking of having a party in Jinlintai.

Rusong: yas we should!!

Jinling: I'll tell Sizhui and Ouyang Zizhen about it.

Rusong: ok. Then what about Jingyi.

Jinling: this annoying boy. Anyways I'll invite him.

A-Die, is Jinlintai under good maintenance?

Zixuan: always darling.

Jinling: would gramps scare my friends?

Zixuan: no. Well I hope not.

Yao: if he does anything to my A-Song and A-ling, I'll slice him with my guqin strings, as if he's soft cheese.

*smile* just saying.

Rusong: we're invincible.

Jinling: lol yes we are.

Zixuan: carry your personal bodyguards.

Jinling: A-Dieeeee, I don't need them. And fairy is there to protect me!

Zixuan: *cups face* A-ling. You're my little Dianxia. You must be safe.

Jinling: ok A-Die.

Yao: *strokes head* my Song'er. You have Rong, or team dimple. Which one?

Rusong: I'll go with Rong. Sorry, team dimple might get drunk and tell everyone about the time they snatched you away from Shizun.

Yao: *laughing*

*glares at team dimple*

A-Yu, A-yang, A-Shan.

Trio: Jiggy?

Xue yang: it's called the art of simping. Ouyang Zizhen will get it.

Mo xuanyu and Su she: we're sorry. And yes, we're disappointed in ourselves for being better than Lan lips.

Yao: oh my.

Rusong: they get more random, Ling gege.

Jinling: lol.

Rusong: now, shall we get going?

Jinling: yea. Bye xiao shushu and A-Die!

Rusong: bye team D. I love you a lot!

And bye A-Die, you know I love you too!

Yao: aww. *kisses* I love you too.

~~

Lanling 📍.

Jinling: does he still hate you? I heard that he worked at your place.

Rusong: yup. But A-Die will deal with guangshan if he does anything.

Jinling: and I'll protect you too, Song'er!

Rusong: thank you.

But Ling gege, where does he sleep? I don't really know though.

Jinling: in the basement. But then he would sleep with Nainai only if she's in a good mood, which is a 50% chance.

At least A-Die and xiao shushu run Jinlintai.

Rusong: *laughing*

Jinlintai ~~

Jin servants: *bowing and greeting* greetings Wangzis.

The Huangdis told us that you're coming. So we prepared your rooms.

Jinling: thanks. We're having a party with a few friends so.

Right Dianxia.

Rusong: So great that you got the message from the two Huangdis. And nice to meet you.

Nice to meet you too hulijing Dianxia.

Jgs: *peeps out* what is A-Ling and that unruly hulijing doing here!

Jgs: *faking* heyyy guys. So nice to meet you. Song'er!!!!

Rong: keep your distance away from Dianxia.

Jgs: but I didn't do anything!

Rusong: hey guangshan.

Jgs: A-ling, you came to have a party here with your friends. That's nice. This place is yours! I say we throw out the greedy hulijing and take charge.

Jinling: *grabs Rusong's arm* there's no way I'm getting rid of Song'er! You old man!

Jgs: why do you like him so much!

Jinling: because he's my cousin, gramps!

Jgs: I see, a new generation of Zixuan and Zixun.

Or even worst, those two emperors. *shivers in disgust*

Jinling: and don't come near my friends.

Jgs: *rolls eyes and walks away*

~~

*suddenly someone playfully attacked Jinling from the back*

Jingyi: YOUNG MISTRESS JIN!!!!

Jinling: *startled* Jingyi, let go of me!!

Jingyi: but I want to hug you!!!

Jinling: you call this a hug? You're wrestling me!

Jingyi: why are you fussing?!! Be grateful, princess Jinnnnnn.

Jinling: don't call me that.

Ouyang Zizhen: yas!!! RD and LD in da house!!

(T/N: RD- Rusong Dianxia. LD- Ling Dianxia.)

Sizhui: Rusong! Long time no see. How are you?

Rusong: I'm doing good.

Sizhui: and how are your duties going?

Rusong: smoothly, for now. I really have a passion for looking after fellow hulijings.

Sizhui: that's so sweet.

Jingyi: Rusong, your cousin bit me.

Rusong: Ling gege. Hahaha, I'm so sorry Jingyi.

Jinling: no need to apologize to him. *pouts*

Ouyang Zizhen: Rusong, you're Wangzi, right. So did you get any mistresses yet?

Jinling: don't ask him that! Gross!

Rusong: no Zizhen, I don't have a girlfriend yet.

I want to focus on my career first.

Ouyang zizhen: what career?

Jingyi: You don't have to work a day in your life.

At least Jinling is sort of a cultivator.

Jinling: Rude!

And of course we have careers.

Song'er focuses more on being a Wangzi while I focus on cultivation.

Rusong: mhm.

See, we make a team in helping the Jianghu.

And hulijings have their own cultivation sect. The Hu sect.

Sizhui: awww.

Ouyang Zizhen: I hope you two find girlfriends soon.

Jingyi: do you even help the Jianghu, Jinling.

Jinling: shut up.

Jingyi: Jinling, I'm starving!!!

Jinling: help yourself Jingyi.

There's some food on the table.

Jingyi: buffet style, I like! You do care about me!

Jinling: *rolls eyes*

Ouyang Zizhen: look, RD. You have dimples. Use that as a weapon to the ladies

Jinling: leave him alone.

Rusong: *laughing* I hear you.

Ouyang Zizhen: and you're already a prince. Who doesn't want to marry a prince.

Jinling. What did your Xiao shushu do with his dimples? The guy has the strongest cultivators dropping to their knees and asking to be stepped on.

Jinling: ugh, you have a point. Everyone is head over heels for xiao shushu. *rolls eyes*

Jingyi: *eating* would you like me (platonically) if I had dimples, Jinling????

Jinling: I'll punch them every time I see them.

Jingyi: lol.

Sizhui: Jinling, you shouldn't beat him up. Dimples or not.

Jinling: but he's annoying.

Rusong: *having some noodles and strips of meat.*

Rong: do you need anything, Dianxia?

Rusong: no, I'm fine for now. Thanks.

Ouyang Zizhen: man, I want an attendant too.

What do you think?!

Sizhui: I could never. I'll he too flustered.

Jinling: they're alright. No big deal, cuz I grew up with them.

Jingyi: can my attendant cook? That's all he need to do.

Jinling: that's a personal chef, Jingyi!

Jingyi: ohhhhhh. Yea, I need a personal chef.

Rusong: do you want to borrow one of mine?

Jingyi: omg yes RD! You're the best!

~~~

Some minutes later.....

Everyone started drinking liquor and partying.

Ouyang Zizhen: what's the most scarring/weirdest thing you have ever seen! Go!

Rusong: Team dimple trying to seduce A-Die by dancing.

Jingyi: no way!!

Rusong: they were also wearing thin robes.

Ouyang Zizhen: omg. I saw a fierce corpse with an arm on top of his head.

But for some weird reason, he was in my bathroom.

Jinling: what????

Ouyang Zizhen: drunk and cultivator should be together.

Jinling: I once saw Jiujiu's hairy back.

When I was 4, I thought that he would have purple hair on his back, but it turned out to be fake.

Rusong: oh my!

Ouyang Zizhen: that's a wicked back.

Can we braid it?

Jinling: stop being gross.

Sizhui: you thought that it would be purple?!

Jingyi: ewww.

Jinling: I keep hearing him being called a purple grape. So I thought so.

Then one other scarring incident is when I walked in on A-Die and A-niang.

A-Die was on a golden table top with a peach in his mouth. And A-niang was blushing and walking towards him.

Rusong: I didn't know uncle Zish had it in him.

Jinling: does your A-Die do that?

Rusong: nah, he's too busy being simped on to do that. But he might do that for Shizun and uncle Jue.

Jingyi: Peacock got some rizz.

Ouyang Zizhen: Jinling, did you see them make out???

Sizhui: I saw Wangxian doing everyday on a roof. But don't worry, *sigh* it was a secluded place.

Jinling: they're mad. That's why Jiujiu hates them.

Jingyi: Hanguang Jun is the best. I want to do papapa on a roof some day.

Rusong: ahahaha.

Jinling: disgusting.

Rusong: oh so Hanguang Jun is your role model?

Jingyi: heck yea. Everything he does us immaculate. Down to his papapa. I can just imagine him grabbing Wei wuxian in a chokehold and feeding him d~~

Sizhui: *rams a piece of meat in Jingyi's mouth*

Ouyang Zizhen: oh not again.

Jingyi: *chewing* Sizhui!

Anyways it tastes good. Can I have some more.

Sizhui: keep the chicken thigh.

Jingyi: RD, is that wannabe Hanguang Jun still working for Lianfang zun?

Rusong: uncle Su? Yes. And he's not a wannabe Hanguang Jun. He has his own skills!

Jingyi: yea, what he learnt from Hanguang Jun.

Rusong: does Hanguang Jun know how to teleport?

Sizhui: whenever Wei qianbe calls him lol.

Rusong: uncle Su is the best, and i love him. Thank you very much.

Jingyi: lame!!!!

Hanguang Jun is IMMACULATE!

Rusong: not your Hanguang Jun almost  immaculately cutting off my A-Die's arm. 

How dare he.

Ouyang Zizhen: things are heating up!!!!

Jinling: Rusong does have  a sharp tongue. So don't mess with him.

Rusong: I didn't only get the dimples from A-Die.

Jingyi: *pouts*

Jinling: now behave, Jingyi. *rolls eyes*

Or you'll be banned from food.

Jingyi: but I'll die!!!

Sizhui: I try not to judge anyone, Rusong. Your uncle Su is awesome.

Ouyang: who are we talking about?

Sizhui: Su she.

Ouyang Zizhen: *confused* sorry, I'm not a Lan. So I don't know your Lan politics.

(Jingyi and Rusong are of course friends, but they just have different views)

Jingyi: well would you excuse me. I have to check up on my hotpot that I'm cooking in one of your indoor Jacuzzis.

Jinling: my WHAT?! Jingyi!

Rusong: why Jingyi? Why?

Jingyi: oh come on. What else should you use a jacuzzi for!

Jinling: this will be so hard to clean.

Rusong: we have guangshan, remember?

Jinling: oh right. 

@verycatbluebird

[hulijingemperor2]

Ayao's three sons💛🌸.

And hell yea they resemble 🥺

[dimpledlianfang]

Rusong is in town again!

Zixuan and Yao: *hugging each other*

Zixuan: *sniffles* Yaoyao.

Yao: Don't worry Zishie.

Xue yang: oh no, what's wrong with the divas again.

Mo xuanyu: they're not divas.

Ok ok, kind of.

Su she: Huangdi

Yao: he saw a lizard and got scared.

Zixuan: it was on my soap.

Mo xuanyu: ohh noo!

Su she: xuan Huangdi, Yao Huangdi's palace is always tidy.

Zixuan: I know.

Xue yang: ohh you found Xiao ai?! Ahahahaha.

Zixuan: xiao ai?

First cockroaches, then lizards! Xue yang, why?

Xue yang: because I love mischief.

Su she: behave!

Xue yang: I can't!

Yao: Chengmei, you naughty little muffin.

Don't scare Zixuan.

Xue yang: then who should we prank.

Mo xuanyu: Lan lips!

Xue yang: good idea!

Su she: of course we would.

Xue yang: but rest assured, Xuan Huangdi. We like you.

Su she: team dimple approved!

Zixuan: as you must, darlings.

We're very glamorous.

Yao: yes.

Yes indeed.

Mo xuanyu: of course you both are!

Xue yang: Jiggy is hot.

Rusong: *entering* A-Die, uncle Zish! Team D!

Yao: A-Song! *hugs*

Rusong: A-Die, I'm going to the city again.

Yao: aw really?

Have fun ok, Song'er.

Zixuan: are you going with your bodyguards and they?

Rusong: nah, only Rong xiong.

I go undercover.

Zixuan: I see! Our A-Song goes incognito. Do you have a pseudonym?

Rusong: yep! Sung Gongzi.

Xue yang: who once punched a guy!

Mo xuanyu: and ran from fame.

Su she: don't forget the dimples.

Zixuan: speaking of dimples, how did you manage to disguise your beautiful face?

Rusong: thanks to uncle Su's talismans.

Zixuan: oh  amazing then!

Rusong: it's really fun to experience the city from a normal person's point of view.

Zixuan: aww.

Yao: Zish, we should do the same some time. It will be fun!

Zixuan: amazing idea, Yaoyao. I would love to!!

Yao: good then!

~~~~

(Rusong goes in the city again. But A-Yao goes to visit his people)

.....

In JingJing📍

Rusong: ah, the city is once again lively!

Rong: yes. Thanks to Huangdi.

Rusong: mhm, *grabs hand* let's get some mantous.

Rong: only that, Dianxia?

Rusong: yup! *giggle*

Rong: *glaring* Sung Gongzi.

Rsuong: ok fine! I want to cause a little mischief too!!  

Are you in?!

Rong: obviously I am.

Rusong: let's go pester the storyteller.

I wonder what new trash they're talking pertaining to team D..

Then we'll have some food.

Rong: but Dianxia, why do they keep talking about team dimple?

Rusong: because they dare not make fun of Huangdi, heehee.

Anyways A-Die is really elegant and respectable.

Rong: right.

Some hours later.......

Rusong and Rong: *looking at some pendants.

Meanwhile on the other side: *immediate uproar*

Make way for Huangdi!

Huangdi is here!!

Greetings Huangdi!

Su she: *helping Yao out of the caravan*

Huangdi! Here are some flowers.

Yao: lovely!

Rusong: *hiding* Oh no, A-Die, what are you doing here? Right when I'm disguising myself.

Rong: maybe Huangdi wished to meet his people today.

Rusong: should I go mess with him?

Rong: no no, you'll be imprisoned by your fox spirits. And your identity will be blown.

Rusong: then A-Die will save me!

Let's go see what he'll say when he sees me.

Rong: sure Dianxia.

I mean A-Song.

~~

Huangdi you look stunning today.

Yao: thank you so much.

X: we have opened up another shop, Huangdi.

Yao: how great.

X: will you come back to buy stuff?

Yao: definitely. You have some beautiful handicrafts here.

X: thank you huangdi.

Yao: why don't your commission for Dongying

X: what a good idea.

X: Huangdi, would you love to have some tea at my inn?

Yao: of course! Maybe later.

X: yes Huangdi.

Yao: you know I should try some refreshments from the outside once in a while. Team dimple and my attendants have me locked in a room

Su she: *laughing to himself*

X: ahahahaha, Huangdi you're so funny!

So tea with Huangdi and official Su?

Yao: absolutely.

Su she: is it 5 star? He deserves the best.

Yao: Minshan. Don't worry.

X: rest assured! Our food and drinks are the best.

Yao: excellent.

X: Huangdi, do you feel bored?

Yao: how can I ever feel bored when I have team dimple and my magnificent empire.

X: aw Huangdi!

X: what about your shelters for the homeless project?

Yao: coming along great. 

X: this new Jingjing gremlin keeps coming and asking for steamed buns.

Yao: ohh. Then how is he a gremlin?

X: he would use his powers to prank me.

Yao: *trying to contain his laughter* oh really?! 

X: what an troublesome guy. Hmpf!!

Yao: he's young. It's his nature to be mischievous. 

X: look there he is over there!! I think he has too much free time! He needs to get married.

Yao: *glances* ( Oh my, it's A-Song in disguise. My darling.

I'll act like I don't know him, so that his cover won't be blown)

Let him live his life.

X: *sighs* yes yes, Huangdi.

Rusong: *bows* greetings Huangdi.

Greetings official Su.

*looks to his right* hey you're that ugly bun vendor! Your steamed buns were stale.

Yao and Su she: *trying to contain their laughter*

X: child, have some decorum. We're in Huangdi's presence.

Yao: it's fine.

So you're the little troublemaker.

Rusong: yes Huangdi. I heard that team Dimple are troublemakers too. May I replace them?

Yao: *laughing* unfortunately you can't. And sometimes they get jealous.

Rusong: but I'm not Lan lips.

X: *grinding teeth* honorable Zewu Jun to you.

Rusong:  no. Lan lips sound better!

Huangdi, I would love to be trained under team dimple.

Yao: I see. Now what are your qualifications?

Rusong: I can fight, I like Huangdi, and I'm jealous of Lan lips.

Yao: *laughing*

X: Huangdi, this boy is mischievous.

Su she: is that the only qualifications of team dimple, lol.

X: child, team dimple is Huangdi's imperial guard and personal council.

Rusong: yea, that's why I said I can fight.

X: *rolls eyes*

Yao: I like him! Come let's have tea together.

Rusong: my pleasure, Huangdi.

Huangdi, is being jealous of Lan lips a qualification?

Yao: *jokingly* of course it is.

Su she: *acting* Huangdi, do you really want to have tea with this rogue?

Yao: mhm. And I love young vibrant people.

Rusong: do you think if he wanted the opposite, he would have gone to hang out with Lan Qiren.

Su she: oh my. *laughing*

Yao: let's go have some tea.

*walking away*

Yao: *whispers* mischievous Song'er.

Rusong: at least it was fun, Huangdi. *wink*

@verycatbluebird

[phoenixcatch7]

Every so often I drift back to the overlord anime but I can never stay for long because it's a good 70% smut with the succubus and 20% side character drama that never goes anywhere. It's a similar premise to svsss, in that a modern guy accidentally gets sucked into a fictional fantasy world he was obsessed with as the villain with a group of people and a place he rules over and wants to protect, and his paranoia/procrastination combo strategises his way to victory.

So of course I thought, 'let's get our dear old scum villain (affectionate) in here'.

Cuz i'mma be real sy would make an infinitely more interesting panicking lich king. Take off that emotion nullification, for starters.

A) pidw was a vr mmorpg with a vast, overarching storyline of the rising emperor lbh, whom players could battle or wed for rewards. A respawning final boss of such strength it took a world wide unified invasion of top players to fell. When sy gets pulled into pidw and all the npcs come to life, so too does lbh, who is very confused as to what happened but remembers sy as one of the players who fronted the invasion (having dug up every nugget of lore on lbh and using that vast knowledge in strategy) and carries an immense grudge that eventually turns into love as he gets to know sy. Sqh is there too, of course, the uncredited game dev who made lbh and his right hand man mbj, who's own base in the north got retaken when mbj also resurrected and is having his own worrisome love story.

B) sy and sqh are in the same guild, named cq, and the demons are sqhs overly detailed npc. Lbh works as the guardian overseer, aka the head npc, and as they wait for the game to shut down sy sneakily makes a joke in lbhs character sheet about him loving sy. They get sucked in, the characters come to life, and sy spends the time he isn't using panicking about the situation, five dimensional politicking, or protecting the base being in denial about the whole lbh thing (and his no homo) and feeling DEEPLY guilty (and hiding it from sqh). Lbh, of course, now having free will, thinks about it a bit and decides to fall madly in love with his kind, gentle, soft hearted lich king boss in spite of his loyalty to his creator. Sqh goes 'dude, wtf' and so goes a very long back and forth as sy tries and fails to come up with the right code of ethics to deal with this insane situation he inadvertently created, meanwhile lbh is strategising how one could feasibly get railed by a skeleton and being the Best Housewife Right Hand Man Ever. And get headpats in the process.

C) sy was part of the xianxia themed cq guild, and everyone (the peak lords) got sucked into either ygddrassil (overlord world) or pidw (svsss). Basically, all the peak lords are millennials old friends running around trying to deal with the consequences of their role play and finally getting to try out the fancy food and drink. I love this one because everyone would be really comfortable with each other, lots of slang and in jokes, a well oiled team stuck in a crazy situation together with ridiculously powerful characters each and every one, and you could have sj as a member! Sy could be the beast tamer peak lord. It'd be so interesting to see what they'd class and subclass as. Sy might still be a lich, but Yqy would be a really interesting choice! Him and sj would definitely still have history though... Hulijing, wood elf, bamboo spirit, human, who knows!

D) sy spent a few years as the lich king guild leader in ygddrassil (I'm definitely not spelling it right), bored by the lack of anything interesting, before the system intervened (maybe as a remnant of the original game interface?) and whisked him off to svsss. Post canon he gets either revealed as an imposter or there's some past life wife plot (some animal that was a boobacious beauty in its past life getting cursed to switch between them?) that turns sy into his old big bad lich overlord form, which is hilariously incongruent with his personality but utterly terrifying and anathema to the jianghu, but lbh is now having to crane his neck back and desperately trying to figure out how to get dommed. Everyone is fully convinced this is sy's og body, and not some modern human one they don't even get to see.

E) sy gets yoinked by system and when lbh (and maybe some others?) catch up a few years later he's in the skeleton body in ygddrassil dabbling in world domination and very eager to see them. The npcs get introduced and draw many incorrect conclusions.

[battletimewitch]

Bruh, Li Jing was responsible for manipulating the previous Jade emperor to almost annihilating her kin the Hulijing.

Bruh my mind was racing when I saw this trailer

I really hope they don’t try and make Li Jing a good guy because he’s really a dead beat dad.

[zishuge]

Today I gave myself feels thinking about Fang Duobing, Di Feisheng, and Hulijing moving on and aging in a world without Li Lianhua. A world where Li Lianhua isn't there — but then again, he is there, in Lianhualou, and in the townspeople who flock to it, bearing gifts for the miracle doctor who once saved a life, fixed a roof, exposed a conman, comforted a child. Young Fang Duobing used to want to know every little detail about his hero, Li Xiangyi. Now Fang Duobing wants to know every detail about his beloved friend, Li Lianhua. The years pass and fewer people come. But if they remember him, Li Lianhua lives on.

(long post, half meta, half fic, bittersweet)

They travel together, with Hulijing, in Lianhualou. Fang Duobing has nothing better to do, so he takes up detective work again. Di Feisheng has nothing better to do, so he comes along. Everywhere they go, they look for Li Lianhua. And in their journeys, it seems like everywhere they go, someone is talking about Li Xiangyi. Li Xiangyi, who had always been something of a legend, but ever since his reappearance and subsequent (re)disappearance, has seemingly been elevated into something approaching godhood.

you should've seen him, people say, floating across the rooftops in red, cold and beautiful, like an avenging hero out of some novel. wasn't he dead? no — of course he wasn't, li xiangyi would never have been so easily killed. but it was bicha poison, i heard nobody could survive bicha poison. yes, he was definitely dead, and came back to life through dark magic. no, he'd been alive the whole time, just held captive by di feisheng. he tried to kill his shixiong ten years ago and failed, and came back to finish the job. no, his shixiong tried to kill the emperor and li xiangyi came to stop him. the emperor? impossible. yes — don't you know, li xiangyi is the emperor's long-lost son?

All of it only amuses Di Feisheng, but it irks Fang Duobing. The same Fang Duobing, who, when he was younger, would've hungered for every little detail about Li Xiangyi and begged to hear more, now finds it maddening to listen to these strangers talk about him as if they knew him. The world might have known Li Xiangyi, but it had never known Li Lianhua.

Li Lianhua, who could wield Shaoshi like it was a natural extension of his arm, but regularly cut his fingers clumsily slicing radishes and onions. Li Lianhua, who would invariably try to shrug off an attack of bicha poison, but yelped and jumped back from hot oil splatters in the kitchen like a child. Li Lianhua, who frowned when a passing carriage splashed mud onto his robes, but knelt carelessly into the dirt and grass to play with Hulijing.

None of them knew any of that.

But as Fang Duobing and Di Feisheng continue their travels, they begin to encounter other people as well. People who come running when they see Lianhualou in the distance tottering their way. People who come bearing gifts — a woman looking for the shenyi who had helped her with her back pain and also exposed the con artist who had tried to trick her daughter into marriage. A young man coming to thank the doctor who had given his father herbs for stress while uncovering the corrupt official who had falsely accused him of theft. An elderly couple looking for the young man who had helped them thatch their roof before a rainstorm and had given them some medicinal cream before he left. (One middle-aged man with a club, looking for the wangba quack doctor who had exposed his infidelity to his wife — he had left after one look at Di Feisheng, standing silently in the doorway with his arms folded across his chest and dao strapped across his back.) People who greet Hulijing like an old friend.

Fang Duobing listens eagerly to every story they tell him, and in return, he tells them about his brilliant, kind, exasperating friend. Di Feisheng rolls his eyes every time, but Fang Duobing notices he never walks away either. They don't talk about it. But it’s as if Li Lianhua returns, however briefly, during those visits; in those moments, Fang Duobing can almost see him standing there, bending down to pet Hulijing alongside these old friends as she grins her little doggy grin and wags her tail. She escorts their guests to the door, and sits in the doorway after they leave, looking out at the world as though waiting. He doesn't ask if Di Feisheng can see him too. They sit and share wine after these visits, and eat the fruit that the visitors bring, until Di Feisheng can stand the heavy silence no longer and pushes Fang Duobing outside to spar. Hulijing follows faithfully, as always.

(fang duobing had brought home a puppy, once. he can't remember where he found it, but he remembers that he had held it in his lap in his wheelchair, eager to show it to his uncle before taking it home to his mother. his uncle had glared, and told him that dogs were only useful to guard the house, and tianji manor already had guards, human ones, and that fang duobing would do better to focus on his swordplay rather than waste time on such useless and frivolous things. he had taken the puppy away and fang duobing had never seen it again. it wasn't until those blurry months as he rode across the countryside looking for li lianhua, hulijing trotting along ever so loyally at his side, that he realized this was just another way that shan gudao and li xiangyi were opposites.)

The years pass, and there are fewer and fewer people who come. One day Fang Duobing wakes up with the unbearable realization that he is now older than Li Lianhua had ever been, would ever be, and is unable to get out of bed for a good half a shichen. Di Feisheng leaves him be.

The years pass, and Di Feisheng grows older too. There are lines on his face, snowy white beginning to thread through his jet-black hair. Fang Duobing wants very much to tease him about it, but the words catch in his throat when he looks too closely at the signs of time on Di Feisheng's face. What a precious and altogether rare thing it is, to age.

The years pass, and Hulijing grows older too. Fang Duobing finds that more and more often, Hulijing can no longer keep up with him when he goes riding. He stops going riding. She gets cold more easily now too, and more and more often Fang Duobing wakes in the morning with Hulijing curled up under the covers next to him, her wet nose shoved into his armpit. He holds her close and thinks about Li Lianhua shivering in his arms.

--------------------

It's been nearly a year since their last visitor, but today there is an old man. He comes in the morning, bringing a basket of plums. A long time ago, he says, a young man who lived here saved my life. I had been poisoned, he says, by my son who wanted my money and my lands. The doctors said there was no cure. But then the young man came and performed a miracle. He saved my life. He saved my life.

Fang Duobing knows it was no miracle that saved him. He asks for the old man's hand and it is given readily, albeit bemusedly. He presses his fingers to the inside of the man's wrist, and is greeted with a whisper-faint, gentle thrum of yangzhouman — a soft hello from a much-beloved friend. You fool, he thinks dazedly, caught somewhere between overwhelmed that here is someone, inside whom a piece of Li Lianhua lives on, and so bitterly angry. What had it cost? Some hours, days, weeks? He doesn't let himself think of what another week might have afforded them in those wild final days, in their desperate search for a cure. Fang Duobing gives the old man back his hand and blinks back the sting of tears. He cannot talk about Li Lianhua today. He apologizes and tells him that the man he is looking for is traveling and won't be back for a few days, but that Fang-mou will pass on the message. Before he leaves, the man leans down to rub at Hulijing's ear. My old friend, he says, like me, you, too, are truly old now.

After the man leaves, Fang Duobing folds himself into a sit on the floor of Lianhualou and gathers Hulijing into his arms. Gently — her joints are stiff now, and he can't haul her around, can't roughhouse with her the way he used to. Di Feisheng comes down the stairs from where he had been listening; he stands behind Fang Duobing and places a warm, steady hand on his shoulder. At the edge of his vision, near the door, Fang Duobing can see the hazy hem of green robes. If he looks up, he wonders brokenly, what would he see? The face of a man forever frozen in youth? Or a face lined with age, snowy white beginning to thread through jet-black hair? He suddenly finds that he cannot bear to find out.

Fang Duobing knows. He knows that the myth and the outlandish rumors about proud, arrogant, beautiful Li Xiangyi will never die. But he also knows that one day, there will be no one else who comes to Lianhualou; no one left who remembers gentle, sly, infuriating Li Lianhua. One day, the old man will pass on and the piece of Li Lianhua that he carries with him will fade as well. And one day… Fang Duobing presses his forehead against the soft fur of Hulijing's neck where it has gone white and thin with age. He closes his eyes and breathes.

--------------------

Years and years and years later, Fang Duobing is awakened from where he has fallen into a light doze reading in his chair by a soft knock on the door. There is a woman standing outside, holding a small basket of pears. I think I remember this building, she says. I must've only been six years old, but I had run off and lost my parents. I fell down in the street and skinned my knees. A kind gege helped me and gave me a piece of candy. He said he would walk me home but I said I didn't know whether I should tell him where I lived. He laughed and asked if it would help if I knew where he lived. He pointed to the most fantastical and wild house I had ever seen. I think it was this place. Xiansheng, does he live here? Who was he? Do you know him?

Fang Duobing smiles and invites her inside. On the bed, the small white dog that Di Feisheng has named, ridiculously, Baigujing, raises her head and thumps her tail a few times in hello. Di Feisheng looks up from where he is writing a letter at the table. Fang Duobing leads the woman over and waves at her to sit down. He sits across from her, ignoring Di Feisheng's eyeroll, and offers her a piece of candy. He always keeps candy around. Fang Duobing smiles once more and says, if you'd like to know — there is so much I would like to tell you.

[angryteapott]

rewatching bits of MLC and I want to say something that shapes my understanding of the relationships of Li Lianhua Fang Duobing and Di Feisheng in the end is I don't think he had to give the flower to the emperor.

Like on many levels I think if he actually asked Minister Fang, you know, the guy with an real grasp in court politics, they could've come up with a different solution. I also honestly think him giving away the flower likely doesn't get them out of the hotseat for long- after all Fang Duobing knows the emperor's worst secret and his father showed a willingness to rebel in order to protect his son. To me giving away the flower has so much ego in it- who's to say this is actually the best solution? But it's the only solution that allows Li Lianhua to quickly and decisively "end" the situation, so it's the route he takes.

Similar things happen with finding the mother bug in the first place- instead of putting in place the oodles of backup they could have access to by talking to his friends, talking to minister fang, making allies with the beast man with beasts, Li Lianhua tries to courtesy warn the palace guard guy p much immediately gives up on the task of convincing him or TELLING HIM WHATS GOING ON ONCE THE BUG GETS GOT sorry sorry thats later and forges ahead with the most independent solution- grab it and yeet because he does what he wants- and lickety split after they find it they give it up and don't own up and try and convince the dudes of the danger. Like all that effort and they essentially hand Shan Gudao a nuke and admit to knowing the one thing that means the emperor pretty much has to kill them in the space of ten seconds because he's uh IN OVER HIS HEAD. Imagine if they had two more guys on the scene. Imagine if they used zhaoling more effectively by telling her whats up so they have better excuses to be places and back up from the dowager au where the girls in the harem use that passage all the time so they mention it and she goes oh yeah i know where that is and they have an extra day to power wash the walls They didn't even have a way to deal with the bug in the first place surely a better way would've been to contact their political allies and get the other guys out of the palace or spend more time trapping the old guard so they have more room to rumble like literally just POISON HIM FOR A BIT AND PUT UR GUY IN PLACE but no Li Lianhua loves lying investigating and being right in the thick of it so that's what they do even tho get the bug first is the worst plan ever when ur stuck in the palace no troops no way to destroy it no nothing at the time i complained that that plotline was idiotic and it is! But it's great writing because it's in character! BECAUSE LI LIANHUA IS BEING AN IDIOT! I GET YOU THINK UR ALMIGHTY BECAUSE JUST RIDE HAS ALWAYS WORKED BEFORE BUT ITS NO LONGER JUST ABOUT YOU!!!!

And same with the flower what now babe the emperor still knows the fangs know stuff they shouldn't and guess what the goodwill from saving his life doesn't mean jack shit like what now hm? Hmmmmm? The succession isn't even certain what stability things are bigger than you can chew alone

So yeah I don't think his one man plan was the only way or even a particularly good one, and I also doubt he'd let the Fangs die even if the flower had accidentally gotten eaten by hulijing or something. I think giving it away "to save someone" was making decisions on other people's behalf that he has no right to make and the only one that's squarely in his corner is "do I want to take this very painful treatment with a low chance of working?" But that's not a decision he wants to admit he has. The inevitable tragedy he's built in his own mind is just chalk lines he treats as mountains so he doesn't have to look his own desires in the eye

[jasper-valentino]

Matcha Fox Cookie

Rarity: Super Epic

Class: Ranged

Position: Middle

Character Inspiration:

Matcha Fox Cookie is not a Kitsune. Her design is inspired by the Huli jing (Translates to "Fox essence) they are also called Huxian (Translates to "Fox Fairy), a fox spirit in Chinese folklore they are also akin to European Fairies and can be good or bad spirits, but most stories depict them as evil. Most depictions of Huli jing depict them as beautiful young women; however, in some stories, they depict them in love stories between a fox appearing as a young beautiful girl and a young human man. One difference between Huli jing and Kitsune is that Kitsune gains a tail every 100 years, but Hulijing gains a tail every 200 years.

Personality:

Matcha Fox Cookie has a mysterious demeanor and an enigmatic air around her; however, having a mischievous streak using her manipulation skills and talent to read people for her entertainment or to get information out of cookies whom she deems complicit to a certain event or crime. despite her light-hearted and mischievous personality, she has an emotional side when it comes to her children.

Powers (lore-wise):

One characteristic that remains consistent about Huli jing is their ability to shapeshift. When a fox reaches 50 years of age, they gain the ability to transform into a human woman. 50 years later, they can turn into a particularly beautiful lady and also into a human man- Matcha fox cookie could shapeshift into a male cookie but prefers the female cookie body. Also, at this age, foxes gain the ability to possess people: by doing so, the victim's memories and knowledge are erased. Another characteristic of these spirits is that they are considered intelligent creatures. For this reason, they are sometimes depicted with a book in their mouth. They can also curse people with disease, misfortune, and death. In other tales, they grant boons such as wealth, fertility, or moral guidance. A claim in Shanjaijing is that Huli Jing can speak but has a voice like a human baby- this also applies to Matcha Fox Cookie but does this to get the attention of travelers or for some teehee's. This can lure prey, and when you're not knowing, you'd be drained of life essence or end up in a supernatural romance.

Place of Residence:

Matcha Fox Cookie lives in the Tea Garden shrine, an island that surrounds the Lea Kingdom. It's not only her home, but it's where she is worshiped by cookies after a Two-year war, the Matcha cookie herself ended. The Lea kingdom itself is based on ancient China from the Song, Tang, Zhou, and Cao Wei dynasties but also elements of the Northern and Southern dynasties as well in terms of traditions, architecture, and beauty standards. Not only is she the Lady of the Shrine, but she is also part of the Royal Court of the Jade Fortress.

Brief description of lore:

Matcha Fox Cookie's story began when she was a small white cream fox, 50 years later, she suddenly gained the power to turn into a cookie, she lost her litter and her mom as she got older but with this power, she pretended to be a homeless cookie for a couple of years to get free food. 50 more years later, her power grew and gained a younger appearance. She began exploring the world for the next few years and then got pregnant with her three children/pups (two girls and one boy) to put it short it was hard when villagers tried to kill you while you trying to grab food, and hard to find a place to live while hunting season is around, so..yeah, raising three was difficult for a century or two until she found a shrine that belongs to the Emporer of the Jade fortress (the Emporer ded currently) however he didn't try to kill Matcha Fox cookie but left her alone there. her time at the shrine was leisurely, but she also became the emperor's pet somewhat until she turned into her cookie form in front of him he seemed fine with it since he had seen strange anomalies before (like the jade wushi, which are jade zombies of dead faeries he found) and kept her in the kingdom, needless to say, she learned a lot and trained herself to use her power to help cookies.

Matcha Fox Cookie found the current Jade King when he was formerly known as Dusty Miller Cookie washed up at the harbor and put him under the Emporer servant care, late to become close friends with the Emporer. After the Emporer passed and Dusty Miller became the Jade King a war sparked and lasted for two years; Matcha Fox Cookie ended the war using her experience in espionage and diplomacy forcing the enemies to rival each other and resulting in victory. Matcha fox cookie was and now is worshiped by the Lea kingdom's people as a moral guide and a cookie of wisdom.

More Food Facts

Out of three of her children, one of them ran away from home cause she hated that her mom lies too much

After the war, she revived her friends (the four guardians) from the dead

She doesn't show her thighs, In Song Dynasty China, it was considered obscene for a woman to show curves. her outfit was supposed to give her a slim appearance (did it work, yes and no?)

Her fox form is th size of a lap dog

If you made it to the bottom, then congratulations, I hope reading was as fun as I did writing it. Also, my hands are cramping :)

[manic-intent]

Donation fic prompt by Blue, who asked for Word of Honour Wenzhou, Happy Ending. E-Rated, Hulijing (Fox Spirit)!ZZS x Human!WKX. Excerpt:

The drinking game that Zishu had lured Wen Kexing into playing was reaching a dangerous stage, with both of them growing muddled from drink. Yet Zishu still hadn’t yet managed to get the handsome young man beside him to say anything that might hint at the person behind the smiling mask he wore. Surely there was a limit to Kexing’s composure, uncomfortable as it was to have to play such a trick on a person Zishu liked. It reminded him of every story he had ever heard about his kind. Treacherous and selfish, disloyal and ruthless. Distracted, Zishu lost another round, but Kexing’s joyous laughter stole away any disappointment he could feel.

“My turn again,” Kexing said gleefully, pouring for them both. The luxurious inn they were drinking within had grown quiet this deep into the night, though Zishu’s trained enhanced hearing could pick up the shuffling footsteps of circling servants.

“Ask your question,” Zishu said. It wasn’t yet close enough to midnight to worry about the nails in his flesh, tipped with a particular poison to halt his cultivation and damage his physique, along with shortening his lifespan. He’d driven them in himself, a blood price bought of pain, paid to an Emperor in return for respite. A way to escape an inevitable end—or so Zishu had thought at the time.

“A-Xu, I’ve been thinking things over,” Kexing said, smiling his playful, dangerous smile. “Is the face you currently wear your true face?”

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[silkpunk]

Fur and flesh to metal and fire: Native woman as embodiment of cultural tradition and anti-colonial re-configurations of steampunk in “Good Hunting”

Introductory note

I’ve seen tumblr posts and opinion pieces praising and condemning the animated adaptation of Ken Liu’s “Good Hunting” in Love, Death + Robots. Whether positive or negative, most comments are brief and reactionary, with some expressing awe towards the steampunk and Chinese folklore elements, and/or disappointment towards its depictions of sexual and racial violence. I’m writing this post as an appeal for viewers and readers to consider the centrality and depth of European colonialism to the narrative, and attempt to interpret the story’s denotations on the dynamics between the European colonizer, the colonized man, and woman in the aftermath of the Opium War. This post draws heavily on Ken Liu’s original text in addition to the Netflix adaptation.

Summary:

The gendered Chinese folklore of the Huli jing and Good Hunting’s subversion

Colonial British “progression” (in the form of steam tech) displaces Chinese folklore

The Body is Political – conquest of body and land

The Empire’s Subjects Strike Back – Re-programming steampunk for decolonial resistance

Personal evaluations on adapting text to film

The gendered Chinese folklore of the Huli jing and Good Hunting’s subversion

The text introduces the huli jing as a figure of Chinese folklore: one that, like the succubus of the West, is a predatory female that seduces and preys on men. It is a folklore that reflects male anxieties of the dangers and dirtiness of female sexuality:

[1]

“You must save him,” the merchant’s wife had said, bowing like a chicken pecking at rice. “If this gets out, the matchmakers won’t touch him at all.” [2]

The huli jing is a figure heavily entrenched in the Chinese psyche as promiscuous, immoral, and sexually devious, to the extent that it even permeates the language: “huli jing” is widely used today as an insult against sexually deviant women (usually against 小三 / 3rd party / side woman, like slut / bitch). Liu’s depiction is thus very explicitly and purposefully subversive in its attempt to give the huli jing a voice, to testify to their innocence (or at the very least, blamelessness):

“She liked her freedom and didn’t want anything to do with him. But once a man has set his heart on a hulijing, she cannot help hearing him no matter how far apart they are. All that moaning and crying he did drove her to distraction, and she had to go see him every night just to keep him quiet.”

This was not what I learned from Father.                                                          

“She lures innocent scholars and draws on their life essence to feed her evil magic! Look how sick the merchant’s son is!”

“He’s sick because that useless doctor gave him poison that was supposed to make him forget about my mother. My mother is the one who’s kept him alive with her nightly visits. And stop using the word lure. A man can fall in love with a hulijing just like he can with any human woman.” [2]

Liu makes his intentions clear in the comment:

In writing this story, I wanted […] to turn the misogynistic huli jing legends upside down. In these legends, usually composed by male scholars, the huli jing is a dangerous feminine creature who uses her sexuality to deprive men of their vitality and essence. My huli jing questions that narrative. [3]

Following Yan’s appeal and the brutal death of her mother, the protagonist Liang and the viewer/reader alike become convinced of her innocence and the huli jing‘s victimhood – we become aligned with her. And indeed, the text seems to unite the native Chinese characters and folklore across gendered and human/demon fault lines against the greater threat of foreign colonizers.

Colonial British “progression” (in the form of steam tech) displaces Chinese folklore

The narrative is set in the aftermath of the Opium War, and the British occupation of Hong Kong (around 1841). Though Yan and Liang reside in a more rural area, the British presence is strongly felt, mainly through the steam trains and railways that come to penetrate the landscape:

I had heard rumors that the Manchu Emperor had lost a war and been forced to give up all kinds of concessions, one of which involved paying to help the foreigners build a road of iron. But it had all seemed so fantastical that I didn’t pay much attention. [2]

The train is widely presented as a symbol of modernity that the “progressive” British colonizers attempt to bring to their “backward” colonies in their civilizing mission [4]. The “advancement” of the steam train is clearly antagonistic to the “primitive” native religion – they cannot coexist, and with colonization, the occupier’s system of logic, truth and tech displaces native belief, practice and magic:

Thompson strode over to the buddha and looked at it appraisingly. […]

Then I heard a loud crash and a collective gasp from the men in the main hall.

“I’ve just broken the hands off of this god of yours with my cane,” Thompson said. “As you can see, I have not been struck by lightning or suffered any other calamity. Indeed, now we know that it is only an idol made of mud stuffed with straw and covered in cheap paint. This is why you people lost the war to Britain. You worship statues of mud when you should be thinking about building roads from iron and weapons from steel.”

There was no more talk about changing the path of the railroad.

After the men were gone, Yan and I stepped out from behind the statue. We gazed at the broken hands of the buddha for a while.

“The world’s changing,” Yan said. “Hong Kong, iron roads, foreigners with wires that carry speech and machines that belch smoke. More and more, storytellers in the teahouses speak of these wonders. I think that’s why the old magic is leaving. A more powerful kind of magic has come.” [2]

Note the privileging of the new and inorganic (roads of iron, weapons of steel) over the old and organic (statues of mud and straw) – the landscape (and later, Yan’s organic body) transforms in this manner. Yan details how the changes affect her: she can no longer transform at will, and barely hunts enough for survival.

Liang is likewise affected. The text explains his decision to leave for British-administered Hong Kong: colonization renders his family’s demon hunting business obsolete, and his father takes his own life:

People stopped coming to Father and me to ask for our services. They either went to the Christian missionary or the new teacher who said he’d studied in San Francisco. Young men in the village began to leave for Hong Kong or Canton, moved by rumors of bright lights and well-paying work. […] As I let his body down, my heart numb, I thought that he was not unlike those he had hunted all his life: they were all sustained by an old magic that had left and would not return, and they did not know how to survive without it. [2]

Regardless of their previous antagonism, human and demon, man and woman alike are dispossessed by colonialism. For the native woman especially, this colonial invasion is particularly intimate, as it occurs at the level of the sexual.

The Body is Political – conquest of body and land

I believe that Good Hunting illustrates how the native woman embodies the culture of the colonized, and thus her body becomes a site of political and sexual contestation. I base this belief on notions from Frantz Fanon’s essay, “Algeria Unveiled”, in which he describes the psycho-sexual antagonism arising between the white French colonizer and the veiled Muslim women of Algeria. Needless to say, real-life accounts differ from fictive re-imaginings, and the cultural configurations of French Algeria and British Hong Kong are definitely inequivalent, yet, they share common rhythms in the dynamic of sexual violence between white colonizer and the exoticized colonial subject.

Fanon explicates how the veiled Muslim woman’s body came to represent the whole culture of the colonized peoples of Algeria:

One may remain for a long time unaware of the fact that a Moslem does not eat pork or that he denies himself daily sexual relations during the month of Ramadan, but the veil worn by the women appears with such constancy that it generally suffices to characterize Arab society. We have seen that on the level of individuals the colonial strategy of destructuring Algerian society very quickly came to assign a prominent place to the Algerian woman. The colonialist’s relentlessness, his methods of struggle were bound to give rise to reactionary forms of behavior on the part of the colonized. In the face of the violence of the occupier, the colonized found himself defining a principled position with respect to a formerly inert element of the native cultural configuration. [5]

In short, the veil, a “formerly inert element” of Algerian Muslim culture, gains significance because it becomes a marker of that culture, a marker of difference, under the white colonizer’s gaze. To eliminate native culture, it is therefore imperative to eliminate the veil, and the native Algerian reacts by resisting this unveiling. In this manner, the Algerian woman’s body becomes a site for colonial conflict. This is why imperial expansion and territorial conquest is inextricably tied to rape – think of the pervasiveness of “rape and pillage”:    

The history of the French conquest in Algeria, including the overrunning of villages by the troops, the confiscation of property and the raping of women, the pillaging of a country, has contributed to the birth and the crystallization of the same dynamic image. At the level of the psychological strata of the occupier, the evocation of this freedom given to the sadism of the conqueror, to his eroticism, creates faults, fertile gaps through which both dreamlike forms of behaviour and, on certain occasions, criminal acts can emerge. Thus the rape of the Algerian woman in the dream of a European is always preceded by a rending of the veil. We here witness a double deflowering. [5]

Thus, it is at this site of sexual contestation of the woman’s body that struggle and resistance takes place. To me, Fanon’s conflation of the woman’s body to the native land and culture allows us to better understand Good Hunting. Yan’s identity as a huli jing already presents her as an embodiment of Chinese “old magic”. With British industrialization and influence, Chinese magic is quelled, and Yan loses her powers, symbolizing the disempowerment of Chinese culture.

As colonial steam technology dominates the landscape, native magic weakens, as does Yan’s body. The violence exacerbates when the characters migrate to the centre of colonial administration – Victoria Peak in Hong Kong. Here, there is a gendered difference in the way Liang and Yan are brutalized. Liang’s engineering talent is discounted – the native’s labour is exploited and undervalued.

“Are you the man who came up with the idea of using a larger flywheel for the old engine?”

I nodded. I took pride in the way I could squeeze more power out of my machines than dreamed of by their designers.

“You did not steal the idea from an Englishman?” his tone was severe.

I blinked. A moment of confusion was followed by a rush of anger. “No,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm. I ducked back under the machine to continue my work.

“He is clever,” my shift supervisor said, “for a Chinaman. He can be taught.”

“I suppose we might as well try,” said the other man. “It will certainly be cheaper than hiring a real engineer from England.” [2]

This is immediately followed by a scene of British clients sexually harassing Yan, now a sex worker.

The dialogue deliberately frames their subjugation as racialized. Liang adapts to colonial Hong Kong but he is not a part of it – he becomes educated in the technical language of the colonizer, replacing his inherited knowledge of magic with that of steam, but his racial difference is constantly referenced (perhaps he’s “white but not quite” [6]). He is a “Chinaman” regardless of ability and any attempt at assimilation. This discrimination occurs in the capacity as employer-employee, master-servant, at the meeting point of the train operations room, the workplace. For the native woman, due to the colonial sexual appetite – the tradition of rape and pillage – violence occurs at the intimate meeting point of her body, on which white expectations of her race are burdened – note how the stereotype of Chinese industriousness is used to pressure her into sexual labour. The colonizers feel entitled to the servitude of both native bodies – the man’s labour, and the woman’s sexual subjugation.

The text notes that this violent encounter leading to Yan and Liang’s reunion happens on a culturally significant date:

“Don’t let the Chinese ghosts get you,” a woman with bright blond hair said in the tram, and her companions laughed.

It was the night of Yulan, I realized, the Ghost Festival. I should get something for my father, maybe pick up some paper money at Mongkok. […]

“It’s the night of the Ghost Festival,” [Yan] said. “I didn’t want to work any more. I wanted to think about my mother.”

“Why don’t we go get some offerings together?” I asked. [2]

Similar to Día de Muertos – the Mexican Day of the Dead – the month of the Hungry Ghost Festival is a time to remember and honour the deceased. It is believed that the gates of the underworld open during the seventh lunar month, and the spirits of the departed return to visit the living. We follow Liang’s thoughts as he realizes it is the night of Yulan, and immediately encounter Yan, which might suggest to us that she is a ghost of sorts coming back to haunt him – she represents an old culture, dead or dying. The story connects the violent encounter, the sexual degradation of Yan’s magic-drained body, to the death of Yan and Liang’s parents, and maybe even the death of Yan herself. Colonial violence corresponds to the death of native culture.

To further cement this idea that the colonized woman’s body is conflated to the land, Yan’s body comes to receive the ultimate abuse from the figure of the governor (or the governor’s son, in the original text). Her sexual perpetrator is not an everyman, but the political representative of the British colonist; where Yan embodies native Chinese culture, her rapist embodies the British colonial administration. He ravages and consumes her body as a colonizer takes and devours territory – I think the showrunners deliberately portrayed him as obese to evoke a grotesque image of imperialist greed and over-consumption of the colonies’ resource. (Of course, this has problematic real-life implications on public perceptions of fat people.) He takes her organic body apart and reconstructs her to his own fetish fantasy of steel and chrome – just as Britain fragments, reforms, reshapes China’s trade, opium economy, and territory (e.g. Hong Kong), to its own will.

Yan’s rape and reconstruction is thus conflated to the political conquest of China and Hong Kong. (Jameson’s notion of the national allegory comes to mind. [7])

The Empire’s Subjects Strike Back – Re-programming steampunk for decolonial resistance

In Good Hunting, the mode of S/F (= speculative fiction / science fiction / science fantasy) enables imagination of how the native can re-appropriate and re-configure the colonizer’s weapons against them. Ken Liu notes:

I think there’s a paucity of good steampunk that addresses the dark stain of colonialism in a satisfactory way. Like many of my stories, this tale has an anti-colonial theme. [Yan] says, at one point, “A terrible thing had been done to me, but I could also be terrible.” It is about as succinct a summary of the experience of being a member of a colonized population as I can give. [3]

A recognizable figure of Buddhism is shown before Liang and Yan move to Hong Kong, in the form of a Buddha statue. Yan is shown in the same frame bowing to it, aligning her with the natives’ religion and again, reinforcing her as a representative of native culture. The next encounter with a religious figure comes in the form of Guan Yin, and if the friend I consulted is not mistaken, it’s possibly the incarnation with 千手千眼 / “The One With A Thousand Arms and Thousand eyes”:

The buddha Amitābha, upon seeing her plight, gave her eleven heads to help her hear the cries of those who are suffering. Upon hearing these cries and comprehending them, Avalokiteśvara attempted to reach out to all those who needed aid, but found that her two arms shattered into pieces. Once more, Amitābha came to her aid and appointed her a thousand arms to let her reach out to those in need. [8]

This statue looks on, and takes up the entire frame as the rapist-governor cries out in pain offscreen while Yan attacks him with her new mechanized strength, her body no longer victimized but newly weaponized, declaring “I could also be terrible”. The Guan Yin statue frames Yan’s act as one of divine retribution – an individual woman’s rebellion that draws strength from a wider colonized peoples and their religion. Though her organic magic had been forcefully amputated and replaced with the colonizer’s inorganic steam tech, the image of Guan Yin suggests that the old culture is not dead, but reborn in a new incarnation, to deliver comeuppance.  

(Personal disclaimer: it is with bitter irony that I must admit my estrangement from these figures – so feel free to add or counter this if you’re more well-informed on the significance of Guan Yin and Buddha here.)

As I’ve mentioned before, Liang’s proficiency in the colonizer’s language of technology functions as a means of his survival, but this same distancing and Othering of him by the colonists keeps him from fully aligning himself with them, and he readily repurposes his mechanical expertise for the antagonistic cause of rebellion, thus engineering not a steam train (weapon of British imperial expansion) but a huli jing (weapon of Chinese folklore and emasculation, albeit the target of emasculation has shifted). The same technology that drove out the magic is now used to empower that folklore.

In these acts of re-configuration, I see an endeavour to visualize how a threatened culture can survive and thrive in the future. Creators like Ytasha Womack emphasize how the S/F genre of Afrofuturism (emphasis on “future”) is necessary for black persons to imagine a future with themselves in it, to provide a vision of empowerment, possibility, and survival [9]. Good Hunting’s narrative, though more of an alternate history, similarly offers a positive possibility in which Chinese culture and mythology is not smothered by colonialism and technological change, but adapted to it:

The old magic was back but changed: not fur and flesh, but metal and fire. [2]

I would also tentatively speculate that perhaps this narrative of colonized man allying himself to empower colonized woman is also driven by an impulse (maybe underlying, at the level of the subconscious) to quell male anxieties of colonial domination and complicity in female subjugation – to re-imagine a history where the figure of the Chinese male is less of a passively helpless witness to sexual abuse, to his country’s subjugation, but an active agent able to empower her. In other words, it could be a case of ‘fantasy as coping mechanism for trauma’ – re-imagining the outcomes of a traumatic past such that the victim-survivor overcomes his abuser (in this case, I see it coming from a male perspective).

Finally, I think this ‘weaponizing the colonizer’s own tools against him’ works on a metafictional level as well: the English language has long been the medium and weapon of English / white supremacy. See Macaulay’s minute on education in which he basically appeals for Indian colonial subjects to be educated in Eng to transmit British ideas, modes of thinking, systems of thought [10]. English language and literature works to naturalize anglo-imperialist modes of reasoning, to colonize the imagination. I like to think that for Chinese-American Ken Liu to tell this story in English is a re-purposing of the language to bite back at the colonizer. And if we regard the steampunk trope as a playful British fantasy of Victorian-era aesthetics, Liu’s re-fashioning and appropriation of the trope – to infuse it with a tale of colonial vengeance – is akin to Liang and Yan’s appropriation of the colonizer’s own weapons. Liu’s act of writing Good Hunting may be exemplary of how “the empire writes back with a vengeance”, to quote Salman Rushdie [11].

Personal evaluations on adapting text to film

I find that the animated adaptation has a heavier “male gaze”, a term coined by film critic Laura Mulvey: mainstream cinema is a product of patriarchal institution, and most films assume the perspective of a male, while the female is configured onscreen as erotic object [12]. To borrow Linda Williams’ words, “the bodies of women figures on the screen have functioned traditionally as the primary embodiments of pleasure, fear, and pain” [13]. The animated adaptation appears more explicit in its spectacles of female nudity and victimhood, evident in the shots panning up Yan’s legs as a harasser raises a cane to lift her dress; over her struggling, restrained, unclothed body; and over her face contorted in fear and disgust. I’ve wondered if this is necessitated because the showrunners need to show her ordeal whereas the writer only need tell it – in film, we do not get to hear her recount of suffering and survival as much as we see it. Yet, I’m fairly convinced the perspective has a focus that deliberately eyes the female form for sexual gratification –  exemplified by shots of her glutes, bust, and unnecessarily bared breasts.  

Science fiction, steampunk and machination has high visual appeal; they delight and enthrall as visual spectacles. It is unfortunate when narratives that indulge and play with such spectacular concepts remain coloured by patriarchal desires, and become so heavily infused with the sexual indulgence in disempowered women. This conventional fanboy approach to steampunk / SF – the entitlement to consuming fantastical tech and women –  almost repeats the desires of the European colonizer-rapist that Good Hunting condemns: 

In a city filled with chrome and brass and clanging and hissing, desires became confused” [2]. 

It is my personal conviction that the adaptation somewhat diminishes (but doesn’t erase!) the anti-colonial impact of the original text through its lapses into the impulse to consume the colonized woman’s body – the same impulse that the text works so hard to undo. So, as much as I enjoyed this and most other episode of LDR (because as a series, it’s not that much different from other mainstream depictions of women i.e. I’m sensitized and used to it), it would’ve benefited greatly from a purposeful questioning of, and distancing from, the mainstream male perspectives of science fiction.

Concluding Remarks

Even with these shortcomings, Good Hunting is undoubtedly rich in cultural meaning and purposefully, powerfully anti-colonial. It is vital to acknowledge its value in destabilizing colonial mindsets and tropes, instead of shallowly and reflexively dismissing its whole narrative for containing sexual and racial violence, and how it doesn’t comfortably fit into contemporary, widely-accepted, Western expectations of ‘girl power’.

Ken Liu’s text does not bemoan the victimization of Chinese culture in the post-Opium War period of colonization, but re-configures, upgrades, modernizes, adapts the old magic to its new technological environment, with the stubborn anti-colonial tenacity for continued cultural survival.

References:

1. “Good Hunting”, Love, Death & Robots, Netflix

2. Ken Liu, “Good Hunting”, 2012

3. Ken Liu, Story Notes: “Good Hunting” in Strange Horizons, 2012

4. Science and Technology: Transport: Railways - The British Empire

5. Frantz Fanon, “Algeria Unveiled”, A Dying Colonialism, 1965

6. Homi Bhabha, “Of Mimicry and Man: The Ambivalence of Colonial Discourse”, 1984

7. Fredric Jameson, “Third-World Literature in the Era of Multinational Capitalism”, 1986

8. Wikipedia, “Guanyin and the Thousand Arms”

9. Steven W Thrasher, “Afrofuturism: reimagining science and the future from a black perspective”, 2015

10. Thomas Babington Macaulay, “Minute on Education”, 1835

11. Salman Rushdie, “The empire writes back with a vengeance”, 1982

12. Laura Mulvey, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema”, 1975

13. Linda Williams, “Film Bodies: Gender, Genre, and Excess, 1991

[maiji]

THE FOX conveys many things one may do to survive or get ahead. It carries such meanings as: cleverness, cunning, distrust, watchfulness against deceit, unconventionality, your job, work (including workaholism).

It's fascinating how well-known the fox is as a trickster figure in cultures around the world. In Chinese folklore, hulijing (literally "fox spirit", and perhaps most familiar to people today in stories featuring Japanese kitsune) can live for thousands of years, acquiring power (and tails) and are capable of taking on human and other forms. There is even a historical figure, the consort Daji, who has been portrayed in Chinese literature for centuries as a malevolent hulijing who manipulated the Emperor and brought about the ruin of the Shang dynasty. #inktober #inktober2017 #lenormand

[ssuminshan-official]

Huaisang kidnaps Rusong 😵

Prologue~~

While on a night hunt, some Nie members kidnapped Rusong.

Nie Zhao and some other nie clan members: *pulling him away*

Rusong: let go of me!! What do you want?!

Shut up!

We don't listen to you!

Don't make us gag you!

Rusong: you don't know who my A-Die is!!!

Certainly we do. Now be a good Dianxia and come with us!

~~~

Zhao: Gongzi.

Huaisang: *opens fan* Sang ge's hulijing spawn.

Zhao: he's successfully kidnapped, Gongzi.

Huaisang: tied him up and imprisoned him?

Zhao: yup.

Huaisang: and don't use the word 'kidnap'. It's borrowing, or simply babysitting.

I'm still a part of San ge's harem.

Zhao: sure gongzi.

Huaisang: good. Let's go pay him a visit.

Rusong: *turns into his fox form, to release the rope which was around him. Then morphs back to his normal form* How dare they kidnap me.

Huaisang: feeling comfortable, foxy?

Or should I say, hulijing Dianxia.

Rusong: Uncle Sang! Did you do this to get back at A-Die!

Huaisang: no no no. I'm babysitting for San ge.

Rusong: lies!

Huan Shizun told me that if someone kidnaps a person, they would hold them for ransom.

Huaisang: haha. That will definitely help Qinghe with their finances. But I chose not to.

I want to make sure that San ge's lineage doesn't go on.

Rusong: oh ho.

So you came out to be a mastermind.

But you look so weak? Do you eat?

Huaisang: that's the point! And yes I do eat.

Rusong: bak choi alone isn't a meal!

Huaisang: I was dieting at that time! Leave me alone.

Huaisang: back to my dark dialogue.

Ehem. You look a lot like your dad.

Rusong: it's the dimples, isn't it?

Are you jealous that you don't have dimples?

Oh this is why you kidnapped me.

Hauisang: I'm not jealous of your dimples! Can you please let me live through my villain arc.

Rusong: you have to look the part, uncle Sang.

Maybe you can do something with that hair. *yanks his hair with his energy*

Huaisang: ouch!! Let go of my hair! Stop pulling it!!

I have a sensitive scalp!

Rusong: *raises hand* and a villain must have a slender waist!

Huaisang: ouuchh, stop tightening my waist!

Rusong: Huan Shizun told me that some would walk with a limp to look more ghastly. Like a fierce corpse. Should I break your leg?

Huaisang: NO!!!!

Rusong: *laughing* ok fine fine, I'm done messing with you.

Rusong: uncle Sang, you shouldn't mess with me!

Huaisang: who are you going to call?

Team Dimple.

Rusong: are you scared?

Huaisang: no!

Rusong: Uncle Su might punch you, uncle muffin might cut off your tongue, uncle Yu might attack you with a talisman.

Huaisang: *rolls eyes*

(In childhood, Rusong calls xy uncle muffin because, Yao would sometimes call him murder muffin.

Xy hates it as well as loves it when Rusong calls him that. He just doesn't want to sound cute)

Huaisang: those guys are lame.

All they can do is threaten me.

Rusong: because A-Die is sparing your life, obviously.

Huaisang: yea right.

Rusong: (just watch. I'll  annoy you so much, that you will be forced to call A-Die's team dimple to take me.

They'll definitely not spare you)

Rusong: uncle Sang. Let's play smash or pass.

Huaisang: I don't want to play any games with you.

Rusong: but I'm bored! And you know what happens when hulijings are bored.

Huaisang: fine.

Rusong: first person. Master Qiren!

Huaisang: ewwwww. Noooo. That grumpy old man.

Rusong: you'll make a good couple. And he can teach you some manners.

Grudges are forbidden in the cloud recesses.

Hauisang: boy, we're in Qinghe.

Rusong: that explains a lot about you.

Huaisang: are we playing smash or pass, or are you judging me?

Rusong: both. Master Qiren, smash or pass.

Huaisang: pass.

Rusong: A-Die.

Huaisang: .....smash. but don't tell him.

Rusong: oh uncle Sang. You have quite a lot of secrets. 

Huaisang: Jiang cheng.

Rusong: he got some work to do, but I'll smash.

Rusong: wait til I tell A-Ling. Heehee.

Huaisang: don't you dare!

Rusong: fine. Whatever happens in Qinghe stays in Qinghe I guess.

Wen Ruohan.

Huaisang: *sobs* why do you keep mentioning old people!!!!!

Rusong: well since that you kidnapped the prince of hulijings, I guess that you needed funding.

Huaisang: You rotten dimpled boy!  I don't need a sugar daddy.

Rusong: Dianxia.

Huaisang: *pouts* Dianxia, my foot.

Rusong: Hanguang Jun.

Huaisang: too icy and scary. Pass.

But he is really handsome, ngl.

Rusong: Huan Shizun?

Hauisang: Zewu Jun right? Smash, but he's way out of my league.

And taken by that San ge.

Rusong: oh too bad. But yes he's out of your league.

Huaisang: oh God, don't mention it!

Rusong: do you like Any woman?

Huaisang: noo. I didn't see anyone I like.

Rusong: well ok then.

Smash or pass was fun with you.

Huaisang: what are you doing?

Rusong: taking a seat.

Nie Zhao, can you get me some tea?

And a massage would be lovely!

Nie Zhao: Dianxia, I~~

Huaisnag: kid, that's my assistant. He doesn't listen to you.

Rusong: but you said that you're babysitting instead of kidnapping me. I guess I have a right over your assistants too.

You're not doing very well.

Should I fire the Nie members?

Huaisang: *sigh* Nie Zhao, get him some tea.

Nie Zhao: ok.    

Rusong: how about we brighten up the place a little.

It's dark.

Huaisang: A-Song, it's a dungeon.

Rusong: uncle Sang. I want to renovate the place.

To make it more comfortable.

Huaisang: comfortable?!

Rusong: *pushes down the door with his energy*

Huaisang: *covers his mouth in shock*

Rusong:  much better.

Can I have a bed and about two people to groom my fox tail.

Hauisang: *stressed*  

Rusong: A-Die said that  we must always  be neat and proper.

Huaisang: .........

Rusong: I would like some food and fresh fruits as well. I prefer my apples sliced.

Huaisang: you'll eat what I give you.

Rusong: ok fine, but the food must look presentable and edible.

One thing! What if we tear down uncle Jue's room and put a hottub!

Huaisang: no!! We're not destroying anything! You're insane!

Rusong: excuse me?

Nie zhao: your tea, Dianxia.

Rusong: thank you.

Huaisang to himself: I have to call team dimple to take this spawn of San ge away from me.

~~~

Hours later.

Team dimple: *barging in*

Su she: Huaisang!!!

Mo xuanyu: what the hell did you do to my nephew!!!

Xue yang: you really want to see the worst of us?!!

Huaisang: quit it. And take him with you.

Rusong: uncle Yu! Uncle Su! Uncle muffin!

Xue yang: shhh. I want to sound intimidating.

Su she: how dare you kidnap little Dianxia.

Mo xuanyu: oh no, he looks so famished. Poor baby.

Rusong: *puppy eyes*

Mo xuanyu: don't you know how to take care of a child?!!

Xue yang: shame on you.

Su she: Little Dianxia, don't worry. We'll take you back to your Jing Manor.

Huaisnag: I gave him tea!

Trio: still a shame! Blehh!!

Huaisang: *cried* he wanted to turn Dage's room into a hottub, he shipped me with Lan qiren and he broke down the bars. Dungeon bars are very expensive.

Xue yang: so that means Dage would be shirtless more often.

Su she: at least you'll learn Lan rules and customs.

Mo xuanyu: does rich emperor ring a bell.

Huaisang: menaces!

Huaisang: but do you think that I have a chance with Zewu Jun?

Trio: no!

Xue yang: he's Jiggy's property.

Mo xuanyu: stay away from Lan lips.

Su she: he's taken!

Huaisang: what's wrong with you! And you always taunt him!

Mo xuanyu: yea. But we love Yao gege. And whatever he likes, we like.

Xue yang: let Jiggy do what Jiggy wants to do.

Su she: he sent us to take A-Song, even before you called us.

Huaisang: yea ok. Now get out.

Rusong: lol. Anyways, speaking of A-Die.

let's go, team dimple.

See you later, uncle Sang.

Trio: ah yes, little Dianxia.

Trio: *took turns to sternly stare at huaisang, while walking out.*

~~

At Jing Manor 🦊.

 

Attendants: greetings Dianxia.

Greetings Dianxia.

Rusong: hi hi. How are you guys?

Yao: A-Song!! *hugs*

Rusong: A-Die!

Yao: are you alright?

Rusong: yes A-Die. I stressed out uncle Sang.

Yao: I know you would.

No one can hurt you.

 

Yao: come come, dear.

Someone get him some tea.

Attendant: yes Huangdi.

Personal assistant Rong: Dianxia. Are you alright?

Rusong: yes. Perfectly fine.

Rong: oh my poor poor Dianxia. Here's your fan. Should I groom your tail?

Rusong: sure. It will relax me.

Yao: ah, what a gentleman you are. Using a fan.

Ruaong: of course. You're my role model.

Yao: *smile*

*opens fan*

Rusong: *does the same*

~

Lan xichen was once again in a team dimple meeting.

Mo xuanyu: welcome Mr. Lips.

Su she: you know why we brought you here.

Xue yang: I hope you can answer our question.

Xichen: what did I do now?

What do you want  to ask me?

Trio: can you babysit a child!!

Xichen: yea......I don't mind.

Are you talking about A-Song.

Xue yang: obviously we are.

Xichen: A-Song and I are close, guys. I was his Shizun in the cloud recesses.

Mo xuanyu: that's not good enough!

Su she: this is Yao Huangdi's son we're talking about.

Xue yang: a little diva.

Mo xuanyu: prince of hulijings

Su she: 🌟shing shing🌟

Xichen: at least I won't kidnap him like Huaisang.

Trio: yet....

Mo xuanyu: the possibility is always 1.

Xue yang: and never 0.

Xichen: why would I kidnap A-Song?!

Xue yang: tell us why.

Su she: come back to our office, and we'll talk some more.

Xichen: we're in the verandah near the courtyard, team dimple. It's not an office!

Su she: you're rude.

Mo xuanyu: we have an official dimple council office, but we don't wish to use it to meet you.

Xichen: why?

Xue yang: we're too lazy to walk so far.

And Jiggybuns told us not to use an official office to give you shovel talk.

Xichen: *laughing* heehee, I see that you're still afraid of Jiggybuns.

Xue yang: he won't give me any candy.

Su she: he's our boss, Lan lips!

Mo xuanyu: well Yao gege runs things.

Anyways we'll meet with you again, Mr. Lips.

Su she: same place. Same time.

Xue yang: and bring some candy.

Xichen: alright alright.

Trio: #protecttheprinceandJiggyfromhornyLanLips!!!🌟🦊🦊👑🤴💙👄💙🤪😖😍

Xichen: *facepalms*

Xichdn: I'm not horny.

Mo xuanyu: when you didn't see Yao gege's dimple.

Xue yang: for a day.

Mo xuanyu: an hour.

Su she: a minute.

Xichen: do you guys even have a job?!

Mo xuanyu: yea. We're Yao gege's extra limbs.

Su she: we're his median too.

Xue yang: we just mess with his enemies lol.

Su she: ok ok. We're Yao's defense force as well.

Xichen: why do you mess with me then?!

Mo xuanyu: because we believe that no one is good enough for Yao gege. And we love him first.

Xue yang: I don't want to share Jiggy with anyone else!

Su she: same! We're certified Yao simps.

Xichen: then live with it.

Trio: *gasp*

Mo xuanyu: Lan lips!

Su she: you can't offend team dimple like that!

Mo xuanyu: but fine. We forgive you, because you love Yao gege.

Xichen: lol, can I leave now? Is the interview over?

Mo xuanyu: yea. See you soon.

Xue yang: move.

Su she: bye Lan lips.

Xichen: *walks away*

Xue yang: weird Lan. All over Jiggy.

Su she: all Lans are like that. Ew.

Mo xuanyu: he so thinks that he can take care of A-Song and Yao gege.

But do we like him.

Su she: Huangdi does.

Xue yang: he is kinda hot. For Jiggy though. 

But I think that he got his horniness from Lan qiren.

Su she: no. Maybe from Wen Ruohan.

Xue yang: that's why you're my friend, Minshan.

Mo xuanyu: he got so influenced by his step uncle Ruohan.

Xue yang: hahahahaha.

@verycatbluebird

[hulijingemperor2]

The elegant Meng fam🌸✨️

[dimpledlianfang]

Published on QuoteV

[seungjecnga]

( SUPER VERY, VERY IMPORTANT POST ABT MY HISTORICAL MUSES )

            hi, hello, yes, this is a post about my historical muses. i say that they’re set in ANCIENT CHINA as if they’re pretty much synonymous to the idea that ANCIENT china is the same as IMPERIAL china.             they’re different ; i did it for ease of understanding and without complicating thoughts of the different dynasties, but i find it of utmost importance that i speak about the world i’ve settled my muses ( my historical kids ) as it does affect the interactions that occur and how they’ll react to things they’re faced with as they are very NICHE muses and how they think, function, and stuff is much affected by what i’m going to be writing about. it should be taken into consideration when you want to write with my historical muses ( and if you write with my mulan must on @rongyv​ ), it will help you settle much better into this world.             TL;DR  — it is important for people to know in which era i am writing in so there won’t cause an odd unresolvable conflict ( ANY TIME BEFORE YUAN DYNASTY —  so no, they don’t know abt genghis khan but they do know about the great wall ). i apologize for not doing this BEFORE HAND to make it more clear on their history and daily life. these are the influences i am writing and what i base them on. thanks for reading...if you do read it, please do....it took a lot of research and interrogating for accurate information.

1 ) TIME —  set  in the IMPERIAL CHINA era ( starting from 221 BCE ; from Qin dynasty onwards ). a lot of what constituted the start of IMPERIAL china began during the Shang dynasty where texts involving politics, economy, religion and such were written ; this became the basis for dynasties to come. but that’s not the point...my muses are based during the QIN ERA onwards ; not to say all eras are synonymous as each had different things come from it, each had it’s own wars that were fought, their own literature and stuff. but the thing that is taken away from this is THEIR TIME LINE IS SETTLED IN IMPERIAL CHINA ( qin dynasty onwards ), not ANCIENT CHINA ( shang dynasty to zhou dynasty )

2 ) RELIGION — during the imperial era were reliant on the idea of SHEN ( roughly — gods or spirits ), the idea of yin-yang and the otherworld ( aka — a spirit world where the dead goes ). this is IMPORTANT to note especially for my sorceress ( xianyu ) and my shamaness ( weihua ) as the two of them are much like spirit intermediaries ( mediums ) BUT neither will claim they are possessed by a god ( a jitong — another type of shamans that specialize in channeling Chinese deities ; a possession if you will ). weihua doesn’t have that ability BUT, she does have a very heightened spiritual sense ( aka — her third eye is open ) and can see beyond the veil that separates the living and the dead.             weihua is what people of that era would call a WU or even a tongji. to be even more specific, weihua practices heavily as a shaman who’s a healer and diviner. xianyu’s situation is much different, with a little more help from the supernatural as a HULIJING, she may often be turned to for help against stronger evil spirits or to help right the balance.             during the IMPERIAL CHINA era, religion had a really huge role in everyday life ; almost all items, concepts, ideas, has a deity, a god or a guardian attached to it.             such as : tudigong ( lord of the soil ) is a deity worshipped for wealth ( because having land meant wealth, having healthy soil means wealth ) ; tu’ershen is the deity that oversees same sex relationships. yuelao is the near equivalent of aphrodite....you name it, they probably had a SHEN for it. this later is gathered under the religion of TAOISM ( lead by lao tzu )...but there’s a FINE line it somewhat crosses as TAOISM is mostly a way of LIVING but because it has a pantheon, it also makes it a religion of sorts as it has deities / gods / SHEN to worship.

3 ) PHILOSOPHIES — there are three main philosophies that they followed: buddhism, confucianism, and taoism.             buddhism — yes, i know, it’s seen as a religion nowadays, but back then, it was more of a life philosophy that originated from the southwest   — isn’t really a religion as it is much of a way of life for people to follow. it depicts the teachings of BUDDHA, on how to live a proper life in order to reach NIRVANA / enlightenment . there is a LARGE dependence on KARMA, and as buddhism also relies on karma, it means in order to live a good life, one must not cause harm to other people or it will come back and bite you ( so yes, they heavily believed in KARMA WILL COME BACK TO BITE YOU ). living in good karma, being compassionate and following the teachings of buddha will allow for one to reach nirvana ; monks are people who have dedicated their entire life to learning and practicing the teaching of buddha. in buddhism, there is a lack of god worship as buddhism doesn’t have a PANTHEON.             confucianism — another way of life philosophy developed by confucius on howpeople should behave and live. his teachings are often the basis for many POLITICAL and government related baselines. he ( and his disciples ) focused heavily on treating people with respect, politeness and fairness. to be honorable and to be moral was something he heavily focused on [ so it would not be far fetched to say mulan was a follow of confuscianism during that time as HONOR was something that was heavily regarded ]. confuscianism revolves around the unity of self and the gods of heaven ; it’s about finding HARMONY with oneself and those around them. confuscianism believes in having a strong and rigid government.             taoism / daoism  — borders between a life philosophy and a religion ; perhaps more heavily practiced in china ( and taiwan ) now, taosim is translated as THE WAY ; unlike confucianism which talks about rigidity rituals and social order, but rather, just...becoming ONE with the unplanned rhythms of life. not to say to just ride the waves, but rather, finding ways to be at peace with life, going with the flow of life, to embrace what is happening and using tao to achieve perfection with the flow of life.              however, nowadays, there is also TAOIST buddhism, which is another sect of buddhism which does worship SHEN and should not be mixed up with buddhism itself. it’s confusing, i know, this isn’t a part of what they practiced before so have no fear, this was an aside.

4 ) RELIANCE ON MYSTICISM — believe it or not, yes, back then, there were even people who DENOUNCES the idea of shamans and sorcery. it was also something of importance to not only the citizens but to royalty. the idea of mysticism isn’t some predestined ideology forced on people or to scam people for money. they’re actually taken QUITE seriously as it allowed people who were lost or in need of guidance to communicate with the heavenly beings for help. shamans ( or jitong or tongji ) are a big part of their lives...while they are colloquially translated as SHAMAN by the english, there’s great differences between what people see as SHAMANS versus what the chinese construed as shamanism.             shamans were the people’s CONNECTION to the gods, to seek help and to seek blessings for things ; when things go awry and there just is NO logical reason behind it, they turn to shamans for help ( and in turn, shamans can perform exorcisms, communicate with the otherworldly, provide talismans, etc ). shamans went beyond magical hocus pocus that we believe today...shamans were really revered for their abilities to provide guidance and foresight for people ; to predict the future.             the royalty, who are said to be appointed by the Gods, and often revered as one themselves ( especially the emperor ) have their own shamans that work for them. they help in making political decisions, in communicating between the mystic and the humans ; they are versed in astrology, oneirology, and so forth. they help write the calendars, they predict days that are most auspicious for things...MYSTICISM is a heavy part of the chinese way of life.

5 ) SHEN  — ( to my personal knowledge ) there is not really much of a BLOODTHIRSTY god in this practice ; as i said, there are gods and spirits and deities that rule over MANY, MANY things...but the chinese heavily believed in being blessed or not. while TRICKERY does happen, that doesn’t mean the deity won’t go unpunished ( if they are wrong ) or the humans ( if they wrong the spirits ), however, there is not a time where the gods thirst for human blood. while sacrifices do occur to appease and to ask things of celestial / heavenly beings, it isn’t of human blood ( to my knowledge ). the major ones spoken in mythos are ones in involvement of creation myths, and lord over much more MAJOR things ( fertility, agriculture, weath, etc ). minor gods is what the humans come in contact with more often than not.             gods in this culture have not seen HUMANS as their playthings, albeit, they may intervene ( as ppl have spoken through stories and legends ). people HAVE becomes gods  — like guanyu or zhong kui or hei wuchang & bai wuchang — through acts they’ve done in life.             to humans, these beings are meant to protect or guide them OR abandon them to suffer and toil...hence worship happens to ask for favors and for blessings in temples dedicated to them ( some even having small ones in their homes to house the gods ).

6 ) FOREIGN INFLUENCES — it should be noted ( again ) that my historical muses are meant to be written pre-late imperial dynasty ( so before GENGHIS KHAN, aka the yuan dynasty so anything before mid-MIDDLE imperial dynasty and before that ). foreign influences such as missionaries and such from europe has been a thing in china for a LONG time ; yes, christianity has made it to china before khan’s time, but it never really took ROOT in china BEFORE khan. there was an instance where religion ( of any sort ) was BANNED or forbidden by emperor wuzhong ( during the tang dynasty ) which officially killed christianity in china ( as per a monk who had written back to the patriarch “ christianity is extinct, ” ).              during this time, there wasn’t any other religion practiced in CHINA other than buddhism, confuscianism and taoism...it wasn’t until GENGHIS KHAN’S time that christianity really kicked it off, but this won’t happen until 16th — 17th century because of the fact that a lot of mongol tribes were neostrian christians and many of khan’s wives’ descendants are christian. it was also documented that the FIRST really interaction between the east and west happened during this time.              while christianity was allowed practice, it never took hold...it should be noted that it’s not something my muses will know of nor dabble in.

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taking all of this into account, my muses actively practices either buddhism or taoism ( albeit, hetian is a mix of confucianism and taoism )...they all HEAVILY rely on shen worship and they all live in the times before the YUAN dynasty.

[huliwifey-blog]

main a huljing, a mythical creature present in chinese mythology that is both revered and feared in equal measure. differing from a kitsune, they are born from the life and energies of nature itself in the form of ordinary foxes. as time goes onward, and more energy is consumed, they begin to take the form of a young woman as all hulijing are female. however, their fox nature is always present in the form of eyes, ears, or tails. in some legends, they are benevolent. granting good fortune to villages or households that present them offerings. in others, they are not. such as the tale of the princess that became possessed by a huli jing and tortured and killed many in the most brutal of ways. the answer for this may lay in how they feed. for hulijing have the option of absorbing the natural energies, such as moonlight. or, they can absorb far more at a time through humans. drinking their blood or more discretely feeding through sucking their life force from their lips. it is said that after many centuries, a hulijing can ascend to godhood. though it is unclear how this occurs.  hua xiang, or xie, cannot recall how long ago she was born. the passing of time for immortal beings is always difficult to describe. especially after centuries fly away. she can however, recall serving as a concubine in the Eastern Han Dynasty in China. developing the concentration in her illusions to conceal her ears and tails. meddling in court affairs and taking just enough life force with her promiscuous approach to keep them from dying at her kiss. often times, she shared nights with the men of the court or the emperor. indulging in sinful pleasures to pass the dullness of her long days.

she would not migrate to the likes of Japan until the Heian era, bored with the hunt within her home country and having to share her territory with others of her kind. she moved on to other prospects, namely her encounter with a mortal man who would change her fate. she had intended him to be another victim. to seduce him, feed from his life force, and to flee into the night as she always did. however, this kind, meek man could not withstand the force of her kiss. his life force too fragile for her to feed without taking it all. even the slightest made him ill. and though she ought not to have cared, as it was not as if she had not killed before, the way he called for her and gazed at her so passionately while being so weak struck her. 

foolish as she was, she married the man without once revealing her nature. proposed to by the pure waters of the lake by their home. she intended to remain faithful to him, since his life was short. and perhaps to follow him once he had passed. she diligently worked to be the best bride she could be. and came to adore being doted upon by her loving husband. but of course it could not last ... 

as the waters became more polluted with the increasing populations, her beloved began to fall ill. bedridden with unnatural fevers and symptoms, she bowed before the feet of an onmyoji for his guidance. caring not that her nature was revealed. the onmyoji determined that he was plagued by an evil spirit, and attempted a ceremony to draw it from him. xie took his promise to return her husband to heart, leaning on it with such force that when it broke, she fell with it. 

for her husband possessed spiritual blood within him, unknown to any involved. the ceremony ripped away half of himself, and weak as he was he did not survive. enraged by the broken vow, xie would become consumed by her grief. she saw herself as betrayed by human kind, who lied and tore from her the one thing she so loved. thus, she intended to make them pay. from this point onward, she began to kill. drinking blood, seducing and sucking the lives from humans. she will not stop until all have perished. or until someone puts a stop to her wicked ways.