#But it was epic in hindsight

[spicy-batman]

Accurate representation of me in the cinema, remembering Johnny existed

Deadpool when:

[botanicallyinclinednerd]

The collective CONFUSION from everyone in the chat when "Penelope" said daughter instead of son

[duhhck]

penelope in mind created w/ absolutely no context besides the soundtrack and vibes (slowly getting obsessed w this musical)

tdlr- i was way off lmao, will try again

+ bonus close up causes shes saur cute to me

[articskele]

Thinking about....... Sun Onceler.........

[lyxchen]

Mann im Mond Akt 5 is probably the most epic thing I've ever watched!!!!! Like holy shit holy fuck shit oh my fucking epic shit, this is epic as fuck I'm gonna sceam what the heck I have never watched anything more incredibly made with amazing resolutions to long existing questions and epic as fuck plot twists and all in all this is the best thing I have ever watched in my entire life and everyone should see it!!!!!!

[catilinas]

not even the first of the romans can learn his roman history in the future tense […] hindsight as foresight makes no sense 🤝 we are trapped in meanings that circulate like blood 🤝 the past will lead on, saying nothing more than what it has already ceased to say

[everysongineverykey]

honestly it bugs me a little how 99% of the comments on the these are the days of our lives music video, one of my personal favorite queen mvs for pure aesthetics and mood, are people calling it "heartbreaking" and hand-wringing about how SICK and PALE and CLOSE TO DEATH freddie mercury looks. like. wooow the dying man looks like he's dying? really? well done, nancy drew! have a gold star! yes aids is an awful fucking disease and yes hiv positive people shouldn't be reduced to washed-out portraits of the words "inspirational" and "strong" by the media and they should have their pain acknowledged but guys. freddie, by all accounts, very much Did Not Want To Dwell On It. he told his friends he had aids and then immediately was like but i don't want to talk about it. i just want to spend the rest of my time making as much music as i can. and his bandmates accepted that and supported him! he wanted to spend the time he had doing what he loved with people he loved and who loved him and he did. he had, by all accounts, a great last year. that one person who took the days of our lives bts color footage and edited Sad Piano Music TM over the entire thing and intercut interviews with the rest of the band also with Sad Piano Music TM and made it so we could barely hear freddie even say anything... it makes my blood boil like he's literally just. like it's literally just footage of him walking and discussing a take with the director and standing waiting for the take to start like. normal video filming stuff. and all anyone can see is a tragedy because he's walking stiffly or whatever

[un-pearable]

admittedly i did spend half the game theorizing that there was SOME connection btwn the conductor and kit (visual similarities. the mention of his shower being broken. him being worried when eggman took over but his kids assuring him that sonic would take care of it)

[stevethehairington]

just saw MULTIPLE reviews of hyperion that said it is the canterbury tales of space and GOOD GOD NO WONDER I HATED IT SO MUCH FUCK THE CANTERBURY TALES FUCK CHAUCER IM STILL TRAUMATIZED BY THAT SHIT

[smallpox-juicebox]

good morning mitaka asa lovers nation. rise and grind my fellow mitaka asa enthusiasts

[perenlop]

its kinda funny how with the reputation xy gets later on that ash struggled as much as he did with viola tbh. totally cool with the meowstic mindfuckery with olympia but surskit has pikachu begging on his knees for mercy

[divinekangaroo]

Today during a work break i was re-reading Ye Olde Nasdack AU (balthier x tseng x rufus) between me and @karanguni (u still about?) and losing my mind in absolute glee.

The amount of times I look back at really old fic and wonder how the hell was I even capable of that stuff when I was that young? How were we? Well done whoever you two people once were, because damned if I can remember who I was any more, just very well done

[calamitydaze]

buckeddie hangout after buck has moved on to the anger stage of the breakup and is on hour 2 of his epic rant going over everything that ever annoyed him about tommy pacing back and forth waving his hands like he always forgot to take his shoes off at the door and he never paid attention when i was interested in something and we would always have to listen to his music and not mine and in hindsight he was kinda shitty to me on our first date actually and he lay so still when he slept it kind of creeped me out and got me laker's tickets for our sixth month anniversary and i don't even LIKE basketball he KNOWS i don't like basketball. and he never even called me my NAME. and eddie is going uh huh. uh huh. yeah man he sucks. do you still have those tickets btw? while doing am i gay quizzes on his phone

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Weinersmith and Boulet’s “Bea Wolf”

On July 14, I'm giving the closing keynote for the fifteenth HACKERS ON PLANET EARTH, in QUEENS, NY. Happy Bastille Day! On July 20, I'm appearing in CHICAGO at Exile in Bookville.

Bea Wolf is Zach Weinersmith and Boulet's ferociously amazingly great illustrated kids' graphic novel adaptation of the Old English epic poem, which inspired Tolkien, who helped bring it to popularity after it had languished in obscurity for centuries:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250776297/beawolf

Boy is this a wildly improbable artifact. Weinersmith and Boulet set themselves the task of bringing Germanic heroic saga from more than a thousand years ago to modern children, while preserving the meter and the linguistic and literary tropes of the original. And they did it!

There are some changes, of course. Grendel – the boss monster that both Beowulf and Bea Wulf must defeat – is no longer obsessed with decapitating his foes and stealing their heads. In Bea Wulf, Grendel is a monstrously grown up and boring adult who watches cable news and flosses twice per day, and when he defeats the kids whose destruction he is bent upon, he does so by turning them into boring adults, too.

And Bea Wulf – and the kings that do battle with Grendel – are not interested in the gold and jewels that the kings of Beowulf hoard. In Bea Wulf, the treasure is toys, chocolate, soda, candy, food without fiber, television shows without redeeming educational content, water balloons, nerf swords and spears, and other stuff beloved of kids and hated by parents.

That substitution is key to transposing the thousand-year-old adult epic Beowulf for enjoyment by small children in the 21st century. After all, what makes Beowulf so epic is the sense that it is set in a time in which a primal valor still reigned, but it is narrated for an audience that has been tamed and domesticated. Beowulf makes you long for a never-was time of fierce and unwavering bravery. Bea Wulf beautifully conjures the years of early childhood when you and the kids in your group had your own little sealed-off world, which grownups could barely perceive and never understand.

Growing up, after all, is a process of repeating things that are brave the first time you do them, over and over again, until they become banal. That's what "coming of age" really boils down to: the slow and relentless transformation of the mythic, the epic, and the unknowable and unknown into the tame, the explained, the mastered. When you're just mastering balance and coordination, the playground climber is a challenge out of legend. A couple years later, it's just something you climb.

The correspondences between the leeching away of magic lamented in Beowulf and experienced by all of us as we grow out of childhood are obvious in hindsight and surprising and beautiful and bittersweet when you encounter them in Bea Wolf.

This effect owes a large debt to Boulet's stupendous artwork. Boulet brings a vibe rarely seen in American kids' illustration, owing quite a lot to France's bande dessinée tradition. Of course, this is a Firstsecond book, and they established themselves as an exciting and fresh kids' publisher in the USA nearly 20 years ago by bringing some of Europe's finest comics to an American audience for the first time. You can get a sense of Boulet's darker-than-average, unabashedly anarchic illustrations here:

https://www.comixtrip.fr/bibliotheque/bea-wolf-weinersmith-boulet-albin-michel/

The utter brilliance of Bea Wulf is as much due to the things it preserves from the original epic as it is to the updates and changes. Weinersmith has kept the Old English tradition of alliteration, right from the earliest passages, with celebrations of heroes like "Tanya, treat-taker, terror of Halloween, her costume-cache vast, sieging kin and neighbor, draining full candy-bins, fearing not the fate of her teeth. Ten thousand treats she took. That was a fine Tuesday."

Weinersmith also preserves the kennings – the elaborate figurative compound phrases that replace nouns – that turn ordinary names and places into epithets at you have to riddle out, like calling a river "the sliding sea."

These literary devices, rarely seen today, are extremely powerful, and they conjure up the force and mystique that has kept Beowulf in our current literary discourse for more than a millennium. They also make this a super fun book to read aloud.

When Jim Henson was first conceiving of Sesame Street, he made a point of designing it to have jokes and riffs that would appeal to adults, even if some of the nuance would be lost on kids. He did this because he wanted to make art that adults and kids could enjoy together, both because that would give adults a chance to help kids actively explore the ideas on-screen, but also because it would bring some magic into those adults' lives.

This is a very winning combination (not for nothing, it's also the original design brief for Disneyland). Weinersmith and Boulet have produced a first-rate work of adult and kid literature, both a perfect entree to Beowulf for anyone contemplating a dive into old English epic poetry, and a kids' book full of booger jokes and transgressive scenes of perfect mischief.

Support me this summer on the Clarion Write-A-Thon and help raise money for the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers' Workshop!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/24/awesome-alliteration/#hellion-hallelujah

[topguncortez]

Slap Shot || Chapter 1

A Jake Seresin Hockey AU

previous part | masterlist | next part

synopsis: You arrive at your new job in North Island, and are hit with memories that you'd much rather leave behind. Jake faces the repercussions of his fight on the ice with his teammate

word count: 2.9k

warnings: grief, mentions of sexism, injuries, losing a parent, locker room talk, hockey inaccuracies, mentions of cheating, workplace harassment, mentions of sex

When you were about five years old, your kindergarten teacher asked you what you wanted to be when you grew up. Most of your classmates gave answers such as “teacher” or “doctor” or “superman”. You, on the other hand, stood in front of the packed gym on the night of your kindergarten graduation, your head held high as you gave your answer. 

“A Stanley Cup Winner.” 

Of course at the time, you didn’t understand that women could not win the Stanley Cup (you figured that out at age 8 and it caused the meltdown of all epic meltdowns). The closest thing women could get to the Stanley Cup was a gold medal at the Olympics. You worked your ass off from the time you could successfully skate without falling, to your senior year of highschool. Every waking moment you had was spent at the rink, running drills from sunup to sun down. You lived and breathed hockey, and as the daughter of the late great Michael L/N, you had big shoes to fill. 

You just never imagined the moment it would all come crashing down. 

It was a dumb idea, in hindsight. It was a really dumb idea. Weeks from the US Olympic team tryouts, you agreed to joining your friends at the lake. A place you liked to avoid like the plague. It wasn’t that your parents and coach kept you away from having any fun in your life, you simply chose to ignore the dangerous stunts your friends like to partake in. But for some reason, you decided to take a chance and take a break from the grueling training schedule your coach had created. It was a hot summer day in the middle of July, and a day out on the boat sounded like heaven. 

You should’ve said no to trying to wakeboard. You should’ve just stayed on the boat, watching the epic wipeouts by your friends. It would’ve been the smart choice to make. . . but you never were that smart. One bad landing into the wake created by the boat, had you breaking the surface with a horrible scream. Your friends reacted quickly, jumping into the water to help you stay afloat as you screamed in pain, your collar bone protruding awkwardly under your skin. They got you to the hospital quickly where you were told you had broken your collarbone and torn your ACL in your knee. The physical pain wasn’t even as bad as the emotional pain that came a few weeks later. 

“I’m sorry, but you will never play hockey at the level you are playing it now. I suggest. . . quitting altogether if you want to avoid having a shoulder replacement before you’re 30.” 

A bullet to the chest would’ve hurt less. 

At first, you laughed at the doctor’s suggestion, all but telling him to fuck off and asking to see his credentials. Your parents had tried to talk some sense into you, telling you that maybe heeding the doctor’s advice could be beneficial. Your dad knew guys from the league who had shoulder or knee injuries, and it never ended up in their favor. Years of pain and suffering, turning to questionable methods of dealing with the pain, missing out on crucial time with their families or significant others. But you were stubborn, and didn’t want to quit playing when you were about to try-out for the biggest moment of your life. 

But you never made it that far. In fact, you never finished your senior season. From the first puck drop, everything was shit. You weren’t as strong as you had been, having lost muscle in both your arms and legs. You felt off balance, and were cautious of every move you made on the ice. You knew the statistics, you were at a higher risk of tearing another ligament in your knee after tearing the first one. Your collar bone, even though it had healed without having to have surgery, clicked and popped anytime you tried to make a slapshot. You were making mistakes you hadn’t made since peewee hockey. Your teammates were growing increasingly annoyed, your coaches were becoming exasperated, and your dreams of making it on the US Olympic team had slowly drifted away. It was a hard choice, but in the middle of your senior year, you decided to hang up your skates for the last time. 

Even though you weren’t actively playing, your love for the sport didn’t die along with your Olympic dream. In fact, you found a new way to get involved with the sport, deciding that you were going to major in public relations and team management. Your goal had shifted, and now you wanted to be the first female Hockey manager. 

But like most goals, that was easier said than done. 

It was 2024, and even with the establishment of the Profession Women’s Hockey League and the US Women’s Hockey team winning numerous gold medals on the world stage, women in the league still weren’t taken seriously. You were told all through college, as you sat in your team management class to choose a different sport like swimming or volleyball or gymnastics. More “women friendly sports”. You weren’t going to throw in the towel and give up on your dream, no matter how many teams had denied you. 

When you were hired by the North Island Daggers, you weren’t sure what to expect. They were known as the joke team of the NHL. Always finishing last every season, being most teams shoe-in win when they played against one another. Having gone from working as a PR rep for the Dallas Stars, you felt as though this was a demotion, a punishment for a freelance article you had written about how women were being treated in the NHL. You knew the article was going to be risky when you sat down and wrote it. You just didn’t expect to get a call an hour after the article was published telling you that you were being sent to work with the Daggers. 

“We’re happy to have you here,” Beau Simpson, spoke as your heels clicked down the long hallway behind him, “As you can see, we need a little PR help.” 

“Yeah, I saw that fight between Holloway and Seresin the other night.” The whole NHL fan base saw the fight, but you weren’t about to tell Simpson something he was probably painfully aware of, “Interesting decision to bench him before going against Endmonton though. He’s your strongest player.” 

“Can’t let him get away with bad behavior,” Simpson shrugged, stopping outside a large conference room with glass walls and a large oval table in the middle, “Hey, I’m sorry about your dad. I got the honor of playing against him my rookie year. Hell of a player. Terrible thing, cancer is.” 

“Yeah, thanks,” It had been months since your dad died from cancer, shocking the world of hockey. You thought by now you would have been used to hearing condolences from strangers, but they still made your ears burn and your face flush. 

Simpson nodded courtly, opening the door to the conference room where two sharply dressed men and a woman sat. 

“Gentlemen, this is Y/N L/N, the new PR rep for the North Island Daggers,” Simpson introduced you as the two men stood up, and you immediately knew who they were. 

“Pete Mitchell and Tom Kazansky, co-owners of the North Island Daggers,” You answered, shaking both of their hands, “An honor to meet you, both.” 

“The honor is all ours, Miss Hamilton,” Pete smiled at you as he sat down. 

You wanted to correct him, but decided not to. Sometimes, it was easier to let people call you by your father’s last name, than try and explain why you dropped it and took up your mother’s maiden name. The world of sports was a game of who you know and who you belong to. If your last name was that of a hall of famer, you were almost guaranteed anything and everything you wanted, and you hated that. When you were vying for the spot on Team USA, you wanted it because you were skilled, not because of who your dad was. The same stood now, as you were trying to work your way up in the hockey world. You wanted this job because you were good at it, not because your dad was hockey royalty. 

“I’m Mrs. Wright, the executive public relations and human resource officer,” The woman, who’s blonde hair was slicked back in an impressive bun, held her hand out to you. 

“It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Wright,” You smiled at her, trying hard to not gawk at the huge diamond ring that sat on her finger. 

“We’re glad you could join us on such short notice,” Tom spoke, “We know that you just got let go from the Stars for a shit reason if you ask me.”

“Thanks,” You muttered, clasping your hands on the conference table in front of you, “I am happy to be picked up by the Daggers though. My dad really enjoyed his time here as a rookie.” 

“Damn, we missed him when he left,” Pete shook his head, as if he were remembering the “good ol’ days” as your father referred to him during his rookie season. 

“The reason we hired you, Miss Hamilton,” Mrs. Wright spoke up, breaking up the reminiscing, “Is because we are in the middle of a PR storm. We have a player who has caused quite the controversy lately and is in danger of losing his sponsors. From our research, we know that you do fantastic work with building player profiles, turning rookies into known players, making the bad guys look like the good boys. We need you to do that.” 

“Okay,” You nodded, “So am I taking over the social media accounts like I did in Dallas, or-” 

Mrs. Wright looked apprehensively at Pete and Tom, who sat up a bit in their seats. 

“Not necessarily,” Pete cleared his throat, “You will be paired one on one with one of our problematic players.” 

Your eyebrows furrowed, before realization struck you, “Wait. . .” You held your finger up, “You hired me to be a glorified babysitter?” 

— — — 

“I don’t need a babysitter.” 

Jake grunted as he set the barbell back on the rack above him. His gray workout t-shirt was drenched in sweat as he sat up, looking both his agent and trainer in the eye, “I’m fine on my own.” 

“You got in a fight,” His agent, Steven, deadpanned. 

“Everyone gets in fights, its hockey,” Jake shrugged as Javy handed him his water bottle. 

“With your own teammate.” 

Jake glanced over to the other side of the workout room, where Wren Holloway was working out with Bradley Bradshaw, still supporting a black eye from the fight that broke out a couple of days ago on the ice. The fight, which was being dubbed “The Dagger Civil War,” was definitely not a highlight Jake liked to have hanging over him. But in the game of hockey, sometimes the tension runs high, and in that particular game, Jake had gone out looking for a fight from the moment the puck first dropped. It was just unfortunate that his opponent was his teammate. 

“Look,” Steven shifted on his feet, crossing his arms across his chest, “The fight is the least of our issues right now. We have sponsorships ready to pull out on you because you’ve been labeled the “hot head” and the “problematic child”. And what is this that I hear about an affair with the coach’s wife?” 

Jake groaned, standing up from the workout bench, and taking the sweat towel from Javy’s hand. Both of them followed Jake through the weight room. The Daggers might’ve been the worst team in the NHL, having a history of one play-off appearance in the 70 years since they’ve been a team, they sure did have one of the nicest facilities Jake had ever been in. State of the art work-out and physical therapy rooms. Rehabilitation pools, and an indoor track. In-house chefs that served breakfast, lunch and dinner, plus tons of snack shops throughout the building. And the best part, two full sized practice rinks. 

Jake walked over to the smoothie shack, where a bright-eyed hopeful girl sat down his regular smoothie order, his name with a heart around it. 

“Here you go, Jake,” She batted her eyes as Jake took the smoothie, making a clear display of taking off the sticky note with her number on it and setting it back on the counter.  

“Not interested, but thanks,” He nodded, turning back to Javy and Steven, who glared at him, “What?” 

“You sleep with her too?” Steven asked and Javy snickered. Jake was going to shake his head no, but had to double check who it was behind the counter, before shaking his head. Steven rolled his eyes as Jake walked towards one of the rehab rooms. 

The moment Jake laid down on the exam table, Javy got right to work. Javy and Jake were like a well oiled machine, they knew one another since they were kids, growing up next door to one another. They played on the same youth hockey team, until it became too expensive for Javy’s family to afford. It broke the young boy’s heart to have to give up the sport he loved, and Jake had begged his parents to help Javy be able to play. Even though the Seresins insisted on paying for Javy’s fees and equipment, the boy didn’t have the same passion for the sport as Jake did, and he thought it would be a waste. Instead, Javy found another way to be on the bench next to Jake, working as the team equipment manager, to athletic training assistant, to athletic trainer for the Daggers. 

“Shoulder still bothering you?” Javy asked, grabbing Jake’s arm and moving it in a variety of ways. 

“Yeah,” Jake grimaced, “Still has that whole clicking thing going on. Guess that hit from Svec was harder than I thought.” 

Javy snickered, remembering the hit Jake suffered a few weeks ago, “He laid you out flat, man.” 

“Shut up,” Jake grumbled. 

“Mhm,” Steven cleared his throat, directing Jake’s attention back to him, “We weren’t done talking yet.” Jake rolled his eyes, which only seemed to infuriate his manager, “This is serious, Jake,” Steven sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, “Simpson wants you out, wants you so far gone from the Daggers, hell, probably even the National Hockey League.” 

Jake scoffed, “I’m the best on the team."

“You haven’t been for weeks.” 

Jake huffed again, knowing that Steven was right. He has been off his game for the past couple of weeks. Missing key plays and open teammates. Almost all his shots were deflected or totally missing the net. Not to mention, he felt like his skating had modeled that of a newborn calf, shaky and off balance. The hit from Svec several weeks ago, was just the tip of the iceberg of the list of injuries Jake seemed to have racked up in the past couple of weeks. 

“Look, your spot is in danger.” 

That got Jake’s attention, making him sit up from his laid back position, “What are you talking about?” 

“There’s a kid down on the juniors that is amazing. He’s either been breaking or matching all your records. They are calling him the next you.” 

Jake’s eyebrows furrowed. He didn’t really pay attention to any other league but the one he was currently in. Of course, he kept his eye out for any information about the national team. It had been his dream since he got to the NHL to play for Team USA and make it to the olympics. Playing on the junior team had been one of his greatest memories, and when he felt for the first time, he could actually make it in this sport. 

How could he have ignored that there was someone breaking all his records? 

“Who is this kid?” Jake asked. 

“Drake Silvia. He’s signed to UMich, but also a projected first round draft pick,” Steven clenched his jaw, “They want him. And they will have him. . . at your expense.” 

Jake felt like his heart dropped to his ass. He had never felt the feeling of fear for his spot on a team before. He’s always been the best. Always been the hot commodity that every team wants, that every coach would roll out the red carpet to get him to visit their team. Before he decided to go straight to the drafts, he had nearly every single college in the country and some in Canada, begging for an ounce of his attention. 

“However,” Steven looked around the empty rehab room before leaning in close, “Henderson signed his retirement forms this morning.” 

“What?!” Jake spat out, “He’s retiring?” 

“No announcement will be made until the season is over,” Steven nodded, “But Henderson is done after this year. . . and the captain spot will be open. It could be yours.” 

Besides making Team USA, being named captain has also been on the list of dreams for Jake. All the hockey greats have been captains. Gretzky, Crosby, Hamilton. Jake’s childhood bedroom had their jerseys hanging up in frames. To Jake, no one remembered you unless you were the captain, or won a Stanley Cup. And Jake wanted both. He wanted both as badly as he needed oxygen to live. 

Jake sighed, knowing what the answer to his question was going to be, “So what do I have to do?”

A smirk arose on Steven’s cheeks, “If you want to stay on this team, and make captain, you need to abide by the rules. And that means having a babysit-” He shook his head correcting himself, “A personal PR rep.” 

“Fine, I’ll take the babysitter.”

taglist: @dempy @marchingicenotes7 @abaker74 @aworldwideapart @atarmychick007 @hookslove1592 @whatislovevavy @lynnevanss @djs8891 @jessicab1991 @senawashere @bethbunnyy @bradshawbaby @coconut152 @jazminlahey20 @averyhotchner @misconceptionmistress @drxgxnslxyer @atinytinaa @hangmansgbaby @buckysteveloki-me @himbos-on-ice @krispybearbouquet @fandom-princess-forevermore @seitmai @ateliersss @kmc1989 @bradshawsvinyl @my-name-is-baby @ashloveshockey

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[ivoryratdoggerythethird]

can the heavens be an actual character in tgcf because holy shit it's gotta be in love with xie lian too 😭😭 i'm talking e-ming style

like "darling of the heavens" is RIGHT what the fuck did he even ascend for the third time??

spoilers ahead! but i love how for everyone else it's like suitably dramatic and fitting and like, obviously no one was really ready to ascend but it felt like a good time like the music swelled and the lighting dimmed and then boom here's your eternal reward noble hero

like yushi huang? striking and tragic but strangely beautiful end, a selfless sacrifice that touches hearts and had her gently lifted by the heavens to honor her unmatched bravery and grace. pei ming? a decorated general, living the fast life, wars won single-handedly and with the loyal aid of the shining blade he went on to shatter with his own hands.

even shi qingxuan, despite everything - the playful and graceful, haughtily noble action of a beautiful young lord, acknowledged but the heavens.

xie lian? the first one was pretty dramatic i'll admit, but in hindsight that was just xie lian being xie lian and his "body in abyss, heart in paradise"

like in reality my boy was just on his live laugh love journey his teacher sent him on EXPLICITLY tho avoid this exact scenario and xl went and casually ended up at the exact bridge where that exact ghost was and thought it'd be a simple normal-ghost job. it was not. his epic words doomed the rest of the narrative, what a fucking mess, mnq must have been tearing his hair out and crying blood

like even hua cheng went up with a bang and dropped back down like a girlboss but my man xie lian's second one was him in the throes of depression and trauma, and the third one was.

what was it even? how did he even do it, he was literally just collecting trash, my guy is such a babey and good boy the heavens just keep pulling him back up like "awww shucks, forget the war crimes, look at that little face!!!!"

like no wonder junwu never got over him this bitch kept popping up into his face every other tuesday by doing nothing