#abyssal palace

[the--grin--reaper]

I need more of Lindon with the Dreadgod cults

I need his interactions with the Silent King's cult who see him as a replacement for their god and say that they don't worship him but he knows damn well they still do. Also they just kind of appeared and he doesn't know where they came from.

I need him with Redmoon Hall because they went under his banner because of Yerin promising them safety and now he just has a dreadgod cult with him that he doesn't know what to do with.

Abyssal Palace probably hate him after Sky's Edge 💀💀

The Stormcallers are a wild card but Lindon definitely holds a grudge on the behalf of Ziel/his opinion is influenced by what Ziel went through. I also think the Stormcallers will be wary of him because of it because Ziel was THE Dawnwing and this is his friend so...

Also Lindon canonically distrusts anyone who decides to join a dreadgod cult. Hell, YERIN is more understanding. Thanks to her chat with Yan Shoumei and Calan Archer she understands that for some people it's resources and that not all cultists are bad and that they are just trying to make it in the world and they aren't all so bad actually. Lindon just don't like them.

[thelaithlyworm]

Daomu Biji Watcher’s Guide, May 2024

A few new entries have been popping up lately, and I’m always hopeful new fans will stumble into the pits and never leave so I thought I’d paste up a rough map.

(Obviously the best watching order, like the best reading order of Discworld or the Aubrey-Maturin books, is ‘whatever first comes to your hand’ but for the people who don’t like that…)

tl;dr:

Daomu Biji is a series about tomb raiding. Think Indiana Jones or Lara Croft but much, much longer. The protagonist Wu Xie is deeply in love with BFF1 Zhang Qiling, a hundred-year-old cryptid, and BFF2 Wang Pangzi, who was stolen in a raid from another book series. It’s comic, tragic, horrific, zany, prone to musings on life, love, desire, attachment, and has many, many piss jokes. (‘Journey to the West but modern’ is maybe the other comparison I’d make.)

Notes:

– This guide is not talking about “quality”. All of the adaptations have their own strengths and weaknesses and tone can vary a great deal, which is to say, if one of them doesn’t suit you it’s likely something else will.

– Wacky endings, and plot threads that disappear unfinished and get picked up a long time later, are as inherent to the franchise as the piss jokes.

– It’s common for the dramas to introduce characters and subplots a lot earlier than the books do. Sometimes we’ll see a character introduced ‘for the first time’ on multiple occasions and strangely familiar scenes. I’ll try to point out the biggest continuity clashes as I go.

The Soft Entry:

There are a few movies that are entertaining as standalones but will introduce various characters and background. I would recommend:

Escape from the Monstrous Snake + Mystery/Grave of the Abyss – two monster movies featuring Hei Xiazi, a supporting character. He’s a pragmatical mercenary who’s going blind in kind of a weird way, and goofy as hell when he isn’t tiptoeing over a vast abyss of existential dread. So many fun action scenes.

Time Raiders (2015) – so there are some textual clues that late in his career Wu Xie wrote this story as a memory-jogger for an amnesiac friend. The plot is a freewheeling wild ride which doesn’t directly match any book plot but introduces some major characters and how they relate to each other. It’s colourful and fast-moving. Enjoy, enjoy.

Conjuring Curse and Misty Creed are… theoretically set late in the series even if the actors look about twelve. Both work as stand-alone adventures, though Misty Creed is maybe a little deep in the lore. Again, colourful and fast-moving.

The Chronological Order

You could honestly start with most of these – they tend to come with a ‘what has gone before’ at the start or a newbie character that things get explained to. The only one I wouldn’t start with is Heavenly Palace in the Clouds, which is lovely but also the second half of a set and things won’t make sense if you haven’t seen Lost Tomb 2 first.

Lost Tomb 1 – a highly digestible 10-12 episode version of the Seven Star Lu Palace arc, ie. Baby’s First Adventure. Introduces A-Ning, Xie Yuchen, and Huo Xiuxiu early and a couple of og characters for Wu Xie to talk to instead of monologuing to himself. The restaurant scene at the end was raided from a later arc and you’ll see it again in Ultimate Note. A book character, Da Kui, was cut which is a small problem because how he died is a minor plot point discussed in Lost Tomb 2. 

Lost Tomb 2 – covers Raging Sea, Hidden Sands (underwater tomb) and Qinling God-Tree (weird bronze tree in the mountains) plus a whole lotta side stories and original content exploring the world and foreshadowing later plots. Mooostly in continuity with Lost Tomb 1 (see Da Kui above) and made as a set with Heavenly Palace in the Clouds – they share resources and a lot of actors, and some threads begun here are finished in Heavenly Palace.

Heavenly Palace in the Clouds – covers the Mt Changbai arc, a journey up a mountain to find a very old, very grand tomb. This was made so close to Lost Tomb 2 that LT2 borrows shots from Heavenly Palace and not the other way around, which is fascinating because it pointedly contradicts the last five episodes of LT2. It also brings forward some plotlines originally from the Tamutuo and Zhang Family Old Pavilion arcs (San-shu’s past in the underwater tomb, and the Huo Family videotapes) dragging some characters on-screen and forcing them to talk about their feelings, which they would clearly rather die than do. Given those plot-tweaks and the early, deliberate continuity clash, I’m tempted to call this a Canon Parallel Universe. Got some interestingly chewy character dynamics and luverly, luverly set design.

Mystic Nine – This is a prequel about Zhang Qishan – Fo-ye – and his peers, but later dramas expect us to know who Fo-ye was so I’m sticking it here. Kinda… picaresque? Lots of action scenes and Republican-era flavour and various factions jostling for power – kinda feels like an old-school wuxia story, only set in the 1930s with all that glorious Republican-era styling. Has some unfortunate cut scenes – the details of how Fo-ye recovered at his family’s house don’t make a lot of sense in the aired version, and there are a couple of missing fights in the penultimate episode. Shrug. Still a lot of fun. Comes with four side movies about supporting characters.

Ultimate Note – Covers the Tamutuo arc (a trip through the jungle) and two-thirds of the Zhang Family Old Pavilion arc (investigating Zhang Qiling’s past is like kicking a hornet’s nest). Very, very flirty and has some zippy-zip action choreography. Politely ignores Lost Tomb 1–Heavenly Palace continuity (Xie Yuchen is, once more, introduced for the first time, now with a romantically coded friendship arc) and brings in a lot of cameos from Mystic Nine and Sand Sea, which it was filmed after. Kinda tiptoes around parts of the book plot, which I suspect would be hard for anyone to film, re: Fo-ye’s actions in the 1960s. Fair warning, this ends on a cliffhanger. This is also where the Xinyue Restaurant scene appears again – two cakes!

Tibetan Sea Flower – If Tibetan Sea Flower ever airs, it will go here.

Sand Sea – Based on the Sand Sea novel. After Tibetan Sea Flower, Wu Xie goes into a bit of a decline and makes that the world’s problem. We the audience, plus Li Cu and Liang Wan, EDIT: a lovely doctor, are pretty much dropped in media res into a number of ancient conspiracies and complicated plots coming to a head in the manner of a boil. It’s weird; it’s messy; it’s mad fun. Like Mystic Nine, has a lot of factions jostling for power and colourful jianghu characters. We will, once more, see the Xinyue Restaurant scene. Also has some side movies.

Time Raiders – The textual hints that suggest Wu Xie wrote this, suggest he wrote it around Sand Sea-era, when his life was a bit complicated. I’m putting it after Sand Sea because I believe it caps a conversation that, ah, doesn’t quite make it into the drama. But notionally this is where it should go. Ah…. at one point, someone tells a story about an ancient ruler, King Mu of Zhou, who sought immortality from the Queen of the West in Tamutuo. The longer book conversation suggests that a) King Mu of Zhou engineered a “trap” for someone like Wu Xie to fall into in the future, and b) that Iron Mask Scholar, a villain from Lost Tomb 1, was an alias that King Mu of Zhou used in the Warring States Era. Which makes some of Iron Mask Scholar’s appearances in Time Raiders… interesting.

Reunion: Sound of Providence – sometimes known as Reboot. Having peaked in badassery in Sand Sea, Wu Xie has to consider what his life is going to be now, and also, he would like to track down a missing family member. So this was tweaked to make it more accessible to new viewers (so some parts of the back-story are not mentioned or conflated for simplicity) and that mostly works but I did find watching this first and then picking up the earlier dramas a bit of a mindscrew. Zhu Yilong is, however, a powerful draw and the rest of the cast sparkles. Probably best to think of Season 1 as two short seasons jammed together, which is to say, once the Warehouse 11 arc starts there are a number of characters who won’t reappear until Season 2. It’s a fun arc even so. Season 2 ends with a badass action scene and then a big party, which I think is a great way to end a story.

Escape from the Monstrous Snake, Mystery/Grave of the Abyss, Conjuring Curse, Misty Creed – these are all theoretically set around or after Reboot-era, though they can certainly be watched as stand-alones.

[hollowknightnetwork]

No cost too great.

No mind to think.

No will to break.

No voice to cry suffering.

[felixravinstills]

Felix Ravinstill — Moodboard — Gray

Coriolanus wondered if Lepidus’s high praise had more to do with Felix’s being the grandnephew of the president than anything else, but he didn’t begrudge it.

— The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, Chapter 14

[akechi-stole-my-heart]

sin of emptiness akechi goro my beloved

[shivunin]

14 / 38 / 48 for the Florence asks! ✨

Oooh, thank you so much! I will answer one here and do the other(s) in separate posts c: This gave me a push to finally finish fleshing out an idea that's been sitting for over a year, so double thank you for that! 💗

(Florence + the Machine Writing Prompts)

Hold Me Down

Summary: In the aftermath of Here Lies the Abyss, Cullen finds the Inquisitor alone at the edge of the camp.

(Elowen Lavellan/Cullen | 1,206 Words | CW: Blood, descriptions of shock/panic attack)

“Hold me down, I'm so tired now Aim your arrow at the sky Take me down, I'm too tired now Leave me where I lie.” —Florence + the Machine, “Sky Full of Song”

“—foremost priority should be seeking out and destroying any remaining demons who might have escaped the battle,” Cullen was saying to a scout as they walked, “take a group and scour the fortress for any signs, and then relay the information to Commander Rylen. He’s kept a troop in reserve for cleanup duty.”

“Yes, Commander,” the scout said, peeling off. Cullen paused as he saw an odd shape tucked between two tents and a stack of crates. 

He knew the shape of that staff. 

“Inquisitor?” he called, peering over the stack of crates. The shape shifted, turned slightly, and lifted its head. 

Behind the cowl, her face was still spattered with blood; it was almost enough to obscure the pale lines of her vallaslin entirely, and what the blood didn’t smear was peppered with ash and dust. Her hands were set on her lap, just as filthy as her face, half-curled and limp. And her eyes…

“Lavellan?” he said, and she blinked, blood-clogged eyelashes sticking for a moment to her cheek. Her eyes did not come into focus. 

Ah—he’d seen this before. 

Cullen sidestepped the crates and crouched several inches away, leaving her room on the other side to get away from him if necessary. 

“Can you hear me, Inquisitor?” he murmured quietly, and her bitten lips cracked open. 

“I am fine.”

“That isn’t what I asked,” he said quietly, glancing over his shoulder when he heard movement in the camp. Just a pair of sentries wandering past. He returned his attention to the Inquisitor, whose attention remained fixed somewhere over Cullen’s left shoulder. 

“Can you hear me?” he asked. “Do you know what I am saying?”

There was a long pause. He noted the rapid rise and fall of her chest, the way her blood-soaked hands trembled in her lap. 

“...yes,” she said at last, her voice faint and flat. 

“What do you hear?” 

A soft gasp and her hands twitched in her lap. 

“You.” 

“And what else?” 

She was still breathing too quickly. Cullen eased himself down until he was kneeling between her and the rest of the camp. If nothing else, he could shield her from their speculation. A meager enough offering, but it was one he would give her without hesitation.

“The…the tents in the wind.”

“And?” 

“Metal on stone. People talking.”

“Good. What do you see?”

A frown collected between her brows and she slowly glanced at him to frown. That was good, too. 

“Sand. Tents. The stars.”

“And?” 

“Why?”

“Answer the question.”

She sighed, but her breath had slowed slightly. 

“The crates. My…my hands,” her voice shook on the last word. “You.”

“Alright,” he paused, “Are you with me?”

“Yes, I…yes,” she moved to set her face in her hands and flinched when she saw them clearly. “I—it was…The Fade was…”

“We needn’t discuss it,” Cullen murmured, shifting onto his knees to tug the tail end of his cloak loose. “You don’t have to say anything now. May I see your hand?”

Lavellan extended one hand silently and Cullen pulled the cork from his waterskin to wet the crimson fabric of his cloak. He could not properly clean her skin here; he hadn’t carried soap with him, and the cloth of the cloak was not especially absorbent. Maker, he was covered in his fair share of grime after the battle. Even so, he could get the worst of the blood off. He knew all too well what it meant to have to deal with such aftereffects of a fight. 

To be confronted with the concrete proof of what had happened. 

Her hands shook in his grip, and they were cold even through the barrier of leather. Cullen pressed his lips together, trying to decide if he ought to offer his gloves. Would she take them from him? He could not guess either way. 

“Is that any better?” he asked when he was done. Lavellan took her hand from him and peered at it in the flickering torchlight of the camp, curling and uncurling her fingers. 

“Yes, I—thank you,” she said. She lifted the other hand slightly and froze with it there, hung halfway into the air. Cullen carefully reached out to take it, selecting a different section of fabric to clean the skin with. 

Someone ought to be helping her properly. Someone needed to make sure she found a bath, food, somewhere soft to lay her head. After all he had seen of her, all he knew she had done, Cullen knew better than to think she was fragile. Even so—it tugged at him, to see her so shattered now. 

“It had so many legs,” she whispered hoarsely after a moment. “Too many. I—I couldn’t—I should have—”

Her voice broke at the end, and when the Commander glanced at her he saw that tears had begun to clear some of the muck from her cheeks in clear, straight lines. They dripped from her cheeks black and red-brown, leaving tiny, damp circles on her coat. 

“You’re here now,” he told her, holding her hand for a moment longer than necessary once it was clean. “You aren’t there anymore. It is done.”

“I let him die,” she said quietly, searching his eyes. “I—I told him to stay behind. It’s my fault. And the Divine—it’s my fault, Commander. All of it is.”

Cullen waited for her to continue, but she didn’t go on. She bit her lip again, staring at him. Ah—but what could he say to her now? There was nothing to be done about one’s past mistakes. He knew better than most what it meant to live with regret at one’s back. What to say? All he had was the words he gave his own soldiers when they’d made a mistake, and the words seemed ill-fitting here.  

“Whatever has happened,” he told her, “I’ve no doubt that you made the best decision you could with the resources available to you.”

Lavellan withdrew her hand. Cullen let it go without protest. 

“I…” slowly, the Inquisitor pulled her cowl down and away from her face. She ran her hands over the relatively clean plait beneath. “Thank you.”

It was recognition, but a dismissal as well. Not “thank you for thinking so,” but “please go away.”

Cullen tucked the soiled end of the cloak away and stood, careful not to move too close. 

“If there is anything you need, Inquisitor,” he said softly. “Please—do not hesitate to ask.”

Lavellan inclined her head, but she’d turned away to stare out at the vastness of the dunes and stars beyond. Cullen exhaled slowly and moved to step around the crates. He halted when she spoke again. 

“Cullen?” Elowen said; not Commander, for once, but his name. He turned to look at her and found her eyes, full of tears but clear and focused on his. “Thank you. Really.”

 “Of course,” he said, and cleared his throat. “It was…my honor.” 

Her eyes slipped away again, but her hands were clasped softly in her lap. Cullen straightened, gathered himself, and strode back into the camp beyond.

[yusuke-of-valla]

There are two types of Metaverse spaces: Home grown and store bought

[haaaaaaaaaaaave-you-met-ted]

Abyss Palace Fan Art by Jun Dong Li

[hardcoregamer]

Every Game in the 2024 Women-Led Games Showcase

This past weekend's Women-Led Games Showcase, sponsored by Disobey and Stray Fawn Studio, included a total of twenty-one covered games. While these titles range from early development to just released, there's a little bit of everything thrown in the mix. The stream featured various genres, including beat 'em ups, life simulators, puzzlers and RPGs.

Check them out!

[literaryvein-reblogs]

some words for worldbuilding (pt. 1)

Air

billow, breath, bubble, draft, effervescence, fumes, puff, vapor

Arena

aquarium, bazaar, coliseum, field, hall, mecca, stage

Building

abbey, architecture, armory, asylum, bakery, bar, booth, cathedral, club, construction, court, department store, dock, edifice, emergency room, factory, food court, fort/fortress, framework, garrison, greasy spoon, hacienda, hangout, headquarters, hotel, inn, institute/institution, jetty, laboratory, mansion, mental hospital, monastery, mosque, museum, nursing home, office, pavilion, penitentiary, plant, prison, rampart, repository, ruins, sanctuary, shrine, skyscraper, stockade, storeroom, structure, temple, theater/theatre, treasury, warehouse, wharf

City

capital, metropolis, town, village

Furniture

altar, banister, bench, booth, bunk, cabinet, chair, couch, crib, davenport, dresser, furnishings, futon, jetty, lectern, partition, perch, platform, pulpit, rail/railing, screen, secretary, stand, wardrobe

Geographic division

area, county, desert, dynasty, kingdom, outskirts, quarter, sector, suburb, territory, tract, zone

Habitat

abode, ecosystem, environmentalist, habitat/habitation, harbor, home, land, nest, paradise, premises, refuge, settlement, tent

Habitat, human: accommodations, apartment, barracks, cabin, castle, condominium, convent, domesticity, dungeon, element, encampment, estate, grange, hacienda, home, house, housing, hut, jail, lodging, madhouse, monastery, neighborhood, old country, palace, prison, reservation, resort, sanctuary, shanty, suite, vacancy, villa

Habitat, rural: barn, burrow, conservatory, desert, farm, forest, grange, jungle, sanctuary, wilderness/wilds, wood/woods

Land

abyss, avalanche, bank, bay, bed, bluff, campus, cape, cavern, cliff, compost, cove, crevice/crevasse, dirt, downgrade, dune, elevation, estuary, expanse, field, fossil, garden, glacier, gorge, green, ground, gulf, harbor, hillock, inlet, knoll, landscape, lawn, lot, marshy, menagerie, mine, moat, mound, mountainous, nature, outlook, park, patio, pit, plateau, plaza, porch, prairie, projection, property, quagmire, ravine, ridge, savanna, shelf, soil, stack, table, trench, tundra, valley, well, wood/woods, yard

Nation

country, home, land, nationality, soil, state

Personal item

adornment, amulet, beads, best-seller, briefcase, cache, cargo, charm, contraceptive, disguise, effects, equipment, favorite, gem, glasses, handbag, jewelry, knickknack, luggage, marionette, memorabilia, necklace, novelty, object d’art, odds-on-favorite, paraphernalia, pledge, possession, pride, puppet, purse, resources, ring, souvenir, stuff, supplies, sustenance, thing/things, trappings, trifle, valuable

Planet

cosmos, Earth, galaxy, moon, planet, sphere, world

Region

capital, commonwealth, quarter, region, settlement, suburb

Room

alcove, attic, bath, bedroom, boutique, cellar, den, enclosure, foyer, gin mill, hall, lavatory, loft, outhouse, parlor, restaurant, saloon, shop, stage, store, tenement, theater/theatre, vestibule

Shape

angular, beaten, billowy, checkered, concave, conical/conic, crescent, curly, deformed, elliptical, flat, gnarled, kinky, misshapen, obtuse, round, shapeless, spiral, straight

Vehicle

camper, conveyance, motorcade, transport

Vehicle, air: aircraft, armada, blimp, dirigible, helicopter, shuttle, UFO

Vehicle, land: ambulance, bicycle, car, cherry-picker, dolly, excavator, model, traffic, truck

Vehicle, water: armada, boat, craft, fleet, sailboat, yacht

Water

abyss, aqueduct, basin, beach, blackball, brook, cape, channel, condensation, creek, deep, estuary, fountain, gulf, heading, inlet, lake, oasis, pond, promontory, reservoir, sea, spray, strait, tide, wash, wave, whirlpool

NOTE

The above are concepts classified according to subject and usage. It not only helps writers and thinkers to organize their ideas but leads them from those very ideas to the words that can best express them.

It was, in part, created to turn an idea into a specific word. By linking together the main entries that share similar concepts, the index makes possible creative semantic connections between words in our language, stimulating thought and broadening vocabulary. Writing Resources PDFs

Source ⚜ Writing Basics & Refreshers ⚜ On Vocabulary

[redfirefox-55]

That speed running achievement was so close to being mine… oh well. That’s what I get for not following a guide, and hoping my vague memory was enough.

[lurkinginnernarrator]

cumplane au where they decide instead of prepping for their deaths they decide to kill the old palace master.

cue shenanigans

think two-man leverage-esque heists all around the jianghu, bringing down minor bad guys to get dirt and such on OPM, breaking and entering, LOTS of grifting, etc etc

And imagine: Shen Qingqiu is in disguise at a party at Huan Hua, hanging off the arm of some rich idiot and. he meets eyes with. Luo Binghe.

VERY FUNNY

What do you do when you plan on working your way up and getting a stellar reputation before showing yourself to the Shizun that drop kicked you into an abyss but also was so kind to you

and then. You see him in disguise hanging off some rich fool's arm at a party at Huan Hua like some courtesan

[momxian]

AU where Shen Yuan gets transmigrated as an Original Character into the Demon Realm a few years before Bingge gets there. But even though he's not SQQ, he LOOKS like a near exact copy. So he figures that if he wants to survive he needs to make himself useful. First things first, he needs to know what the hell is going on, so he starts working with lower level demons setting himself up as someone necessary, and relatively important so he can figure out when in the plot they are. It's pretty easy, there's not much in the way of organization down here and despite everything he's not that bad an actor. It helps that SQJ's face is beautiful in every setting and he will quickly create a reputation of the stubborn beauty amongst the demon realm. It's around this time he starts wearing a veil to mask his resemblance to SQJ, but really it just adds to the mysterious allure aspect.

He utilizes his plot knowledge to get things ready for Binghe's arrival, tidying up the palace, setting up good staff, getting rid of some of the smaller villains that kidnap Ning Yingying and Liu Mingyan etc later. Actually a lot of smaller villains who kidnap, harass or belittle Bingge's harem. It's like every time he's running an errand he meets another piece of cannon fodder that will inevitably lead Bingge to another papapa scene. It's fine, by the time he's done with them (thank god this body doesn't have the same limitations as his old one) they follow him around with big demon puppy eyes and scramble to do chores and tasks for him.

By the time the Endless Abyss moment is set to happen, SY has thorough knowledge of the abyss and all of the special items tucked away in various locations across it. You can't be mad and murder someone who helped you through the torture torment evil maze of plot relevant trauma, right?

He finds Bingge post fall and does his best to act callous and only vaguely helpful, leading Bingge in the right direction and away from the biggest threats. His goal is to be a helpful and forgettable NPC. Someone who, if he runs into him again, Bingge will have mercy for and be left alone. Despite his resemblance to SQJ. But what he doesn't take into account is A) in no version of this story is he capable of being that hands off and B) Bingge was just shown kindness for the first time in years by a mysterious and elusive beauty with brilliant eyes and an obvious intelligence.

Since this is Bingge and not Binghe, he doesn't immediately fall for SY, and is in fact wildly paranoid, terrified and angry about things in general. But every time something seems to go wrong in the abyss, instead of taking the hits and becoming the stallion protagonist, SY shows up to give him a magic item, or rushes in to protect him from fatal blows and on two separate occasions thoughtlessly petted Bingge's hair when he was injured, which rattled Bingge so bad that he almost died again fighting the next monster.

Shen Yuan is gone often enough that he still makes his way to the Demon Palace, collects Xin Mo and builds his harem, though it's smaller than it was originally. Mostly because SY had taken out the smaller villains and then because SY had interfered with Bingge's quests so often.

Obviously Shen Yuan has a soft spot for Bingge now but doesn't admit it. But he's satisfied he can slip away now without too much consequence, except no he can't. Bingge asks for him, to collect something for him. To ask him something about another demon. To just stare at him for a half hour with a vein about to pop in his forehead as he tried to see through the veil before huffing and sending him away again.

Since Bingge is obviously not going to let him slip away, and SY isn't sure if Bingge is going to kill him or not he desperately makes himself useful again. He takes care of Bingge's harem. That's a lot of housing and food and clothes to take care of! The girls fight often! He'll just slip into the mix and keep the peace until Bingge forgets about him. And in the meantime sometimes he tends to Bingge and he and Bingge have dinner together. And isn't it so cute how the stallion protagonist can blush when he compliments the dish? And once or twice he combs out Bingge's hair. And sometimes Bingge rubs the scowl from between Shen Yuan's brows and lets his finger outline his jaw over the silk of his veil when SY is tending to tedious business.

Yeah, I'm sure one of these days Bingge will let you slip away SY.

Anyway Bingge is just relieved that Shen Yuan has accepted that he's part of the harem now.

[felixravinstills]

inspired by @persephoneprice's post

(each answer comes with a free lab rat)

[disgracefulthings]

AU where, after throwing Luo Binghe into the abyss and Shen Qingqiu stops eating because the food on his peak is too bland, he discovers that a. Shang Qinghua is a good cook and b. that it's very similar to Binghe's cooking. He decides to have his meals over on An Ding, which confuses his fellow peak lords, but they are also very relieved because he is actually eating.

When Luo Binghe escapes from the abyss he ends up hearing rumors about this, and sees Shang Qinghua as a romantic rival. Instead of taking over HHP, he decides to open a restaurant because clearly the way into his Shizun's heart isn't to become a respected cultivator, but through his stomach. Shang Qinghua does have one thing over Binghe, and that's his ability to make modern dishes that Shen Qingqiu misses.

Shen Qingqiu and Shang Qinghua are very confused and have no idea what Binghe's restaurant has to do with his plans for revenge, and they think it's safe for Shang Qinghua to go in to spy because Luo Binghe would want nothing to do with him.

However, when Luo Binghe spots Shang Qinghua in his restaurant, he challenges him to a cooking competition with Shen Qingqiu as the one and only judge. Shang Qinghua doesn't want to die, so he agrees, but he is afraid that Binghe would take Shen Qingqiu if he loses, so he decides that he needs to out cook Binghe to save Shen Qingqiu's life.

Shen Qingqiu has no idea what's going on (classic Shen Qingqiu) and agrees to judge. Binghe makes him his favorite dish from Qing Jing Peak, while Shang Qinghua makes him his favorite modern dish.

In the end, Shen Qingqiu can't choose because both of the dishes are really good, and Binghe breaks down, saying that if Shen Qingqiu really likes Shang Qinghua's cooking, then he is willing for both of them to marry Shen Qingqiu.

Shang Qinghua, who had no idea that those were the stakes, backs out of the competition because he had no interest in marrying his bro (Mobei-Jun has been stewing in jealousy this whole time and decided that in order to win Shang Qinghua's heart, he needed to cook for him. When it's revealed that Shang Qinghua doesn't love Shen Qingqiu, he takes him back to his palace and presents him with all the food he has learned to make. While not as good as the protagonist's, Shang Qinghua is still moved because he never thought anyone would make something for him, much less his spoiled king)

Shen Qingqiu and Luo Binghe do make up and get married, and Binghe reluctantly asks Shang Qinghua advice for making modern meals

[pretend-i-don-t-exist]

I am going to create Heavenly Demon Lore purely to sate my thirst for heavenly demon!sy

It would be so funny like sy would likely be good at being a demon purely going with his knowledge of pidw, but he'd be very bad at it bc he doesn't want to kill people! humans or demons, he doesn't want to kill them! except he unintentionally and accidentally seduces a lot of them and somehow that's worse

he and tianlang-jun would be so good tho. they'll create a book club whete sy roasts the hell out of novels and tlj, very amused, will just egg him on. heavenly demon cousins, or brothers or smth

sy would be so bad at pretending to be a human, but in a good way??? like he has scarily accurate knowledge of the endless abyss and demonic beasts, but he did say he was a traveling scholar, so... his eyes also sometimes flash red when he's ranting about the latest romance book, but maybe it's just a trick of the light?

sy is v caring and clumsy and naïve, he can't possibly be a demon! except he is. he's so bad at pretending that it somehow turned 180⁰ and now everyone is scrambling to fool themselves into thinking that sy is just a Very Weird Human

tlj thinks it's hilarious, and so unfair. but hey, at least he's not gonna get trapped under a mountain anytime soon bc the old palace master is desperate to convince everyone that sy is a heavenly demon waiting for the perfect chance to get rid of all of them