#adult zhuiling

[twistedappletree]

Thinking about older/adult zhuiling and how they’d technically be in an LDR?? Jin Ling is the new sect leader of the Jin clan and Lan Sizhui is basically traveling around with his undead uncle doing whatever the hell he wants because fck the police

I personally headcanon that LSZ is a free spirit for sure and isn’t the type who needs to be around his S/O all the time to love them and feel secure in their relationship but I feel like JL would lowkey haaaaate the constant distance so much (he’s baby, let him be clingy lmao) that he’d keep making up excuses to either visit the Cloud Recesses or bring LSZ to Jinlintai

and everyone in Jinlintai is looking at LSZ like “why is he here again?” so JL keeps saying it’s sect leader stuff, official business and everyone’s like “okay and that official business involves him wearing your clothes and sleeping in your room every night???” 💀💀

[unforth]

One of the anti takes I find most confusing in any fandom I've ever been in is the "you can't ship Lan Sizhui and Jin Ling, they're cousins!" take. Which I just saw again this morning and am perpetually baffled by. Like. How? HOW ARE THEY COUSINS?

Biologically?

Jin Ling's parents: Jin Zixuan and Jiang Yanli

Lan Sizhui's parents: two unnamed Wens, presumably from the Dafan Wen group (at least in CQL, in the books they're just. Whoever.)

Biologically cousins? No. 🚫

Socially?

Jin Ling: raised at Carp Tower and Lotus Pier

Lan Sizhui: raised at somewhere Wen, then Burial Mounds, then Cloud Recesses

Socially related/adopted together/raised together? No. 🚫

Same clan so maybe somehow related? No. 🚫

(ETA: it has been pointed out to me there's a third way, so I'll add that I guess? Which is:

Socially?

Jin Guangyao, Nie Mingjue, Lan Xichen = sworn brothers

Lan Xichen, Lan Wangji = blood related brothers

Jin Guangyao, Jin Zixuan = blood related (half-)brothers.

Therefore, Jin Guangyao, Nie Mingjue, Lan Xichen, Lan Wangji, Jin Zixuan all = brothers

Lan Wangji = Lan Sizhui's adopted father

Jin Guangyao = Jin Ling's blood related brother

Jin Zixuan = Jin Ling's blood related dad

Therefore, because Lan Wangji, Jin Zixuan, and Jin Guangyao are "brothers," and Lan Wangji is Lan Sizhui's "father," Lan Sizhui and Jin Ling must be "cousins."

Any actual relationship between these people??????? NO. 🚫

DO I LITERALLY EVER SEE "You can't ship Xiyao or Nielan or 3zun because they're ~brothers~?" ALSO NO. 🚫

ANTIS. Will say ANYTHING. Rather than admit "this just makes me uncomfortable and I wish people would stop. What. The. Fuck.

/end ETA)

If they're not blood relatives, they weren't raised together, they weren't brought up thinking they were related, they weren't ever in canon raised as cousins in any way then HOW. ARE THEY. COUSINS.

Like this take I saw today (right before I blocked the person who posted it) said "you can say technically they're not, but they are!" And like. The only possible logic I have for this is "Wei Wuxian is Jiang Yanli's adopted brother, which is the same as a blood relative because I'm an anti and I say so, and Wei Wuxian had a hand in parenting Lan Sizhui for a single year when canon gives no reason to think he was the primary caretaker, so that makes Wei Wuxian Lan Sizhui's dad, and since Wei Wuxian is Lan Sizhui's dad and Jiang Yanli is Jin Ling's mom then they're cousins" which is. Fucking unhinged? What universe do these people live in? Where this is how relatives are established??

Am I missing something? Am I forgetting something in canon?? The only other explanation I've ever come up with is "in settings with a social elite most upper class people are usually related in some way" but by that argument every single ship in the fandom including the canon one would be incest so I can't imagine that's the thinking???

Can literally ANYONE explain to me how people who are against Zhuiling have convinced themselves that they're NOT the ones nitpicking??

Please. I genuinely am trying to figure out the logic here. I think I've posted asking this before but I still don't get it. Like. What the fuck.

[ibijau]

zhuiling, “ah-ah-ah. You’re sick. You need to stay in bed.”

“It’s not so bad,” Lan Sizhui insisted, keeping his eyes closed because the light hurt too much. “I’m quite well, really.”

Jin Ling rolled his eyes and pulled the cover almost to his husband’s nose.

“Ah, ah, ah. You’re sick. You need to stay in bed.”

“Not sick,” Lan Sizhui complained with a slight pout that, after twenty years, had no right to still make Jin Ling go this soft inside. “‘S just a little curse.”

“Let that teach you to be more careful on Night Hunt!” Jin Ling grunted. “Getting hit like that, at your age! I’m sending you back to train with the juniors as soon as you’re back on your feet!”

Hearing him raise his voice, Lan Sizhui winced in pain. The curse, so far, mostly plagued him with headaches and a mild fever. It would be gone within a week, or so the healer said. That demon had been awful weak after all.

“Was going to hit A-Li,” Lan Sizhui mumbled. “Couldn’t let that happen.”

“She’d have survived. She’s stronger than you.”

“Rude.”

“True. Our daughter is a full head taller than you, and about twice as strong, deal with it. And if she’d been hit, I’d be scolding her, trust me! It was an easy Night Hunt and she’s supposed to set an example for BaoBao! Getting caught by surprise… I’ll probably still scold her,” Jin Ling decided.

Lan Sizhui weakly cried out at the threat and tried to sit up, only for his husband to grab him by the shoulders and push him down against the pillow.

“Save me from the stubbornness of Lans!” Jin Ling grumbled. “I swear if you set one foot out of this bed before you’re allowed, I’m calling your dad.”

“Hanguang-Jun would understand that…”

“Your other dad,” Jin Ling precised with a cruel smirk, amused when Lan Sizhui groaned in horror. “He’ll dote on you. He’ll make you soup!”

“A-Ling, don’t.”

“He’ll be fussing! You know he’ll be fussing. I bet he’ll even tuck you under the blanket and sing for you.”

Lan Sizhui grimaced at the prospect. When he was young and newly reunited with Wei Wuxian, he used to find it very sweet that his other father would sometimes treat him like a little boy. Now, at forty and with two children old enough for Night Hunts, Lan Sizhui really wished that Wei Wuxian would notice that he was, in fact, an adult.

It amused Jin Ling endlessly, and he wasn’t above using it to his advantage… for example when his husband was cursed and acting unreasonable.

“You’re awful,” Lan Sizhui complained. “Don’t call him.”

“Then stay in bed.”

Lan Sizhui sighed at the infamy of having to rest for a few days, but finally stopped trying to escape the bed and settled in to sleep for a moment.

“Hate you, A-Ling,” he muttered.

“Love you too,” Jin Ling retorted. “I’ll come check on you after that meeting, and I’ll know it if you moved!”

His husband mumbled without conviction, already half asleep. It was Jin Ling’s turn to sigh but in fondness. He couldn’t resist leaning over the bed to press a kiss to Lan Sizhui’s forehead (still burning and sweating, he’d need to drink later) before he dashed out of the room to take care of the day’s business.

[hamliet]

Hi, Hamliet....Can I ask you something? First of all thank you so much for your metas and fanfics about MXTX works (especially MDZS). Your fanfic, "Heaven's Grandmaster of Self-Saving " is one of my favorite fanfic....🤩😊🌷, thank you so much for sharing your wonderful writings....

Now I know that technically there is only one gay couple in MDZS and that is WangXian. But why is it that I also ships other couples? Like ZhuiLing, XiYao and even XueXiao....My friend ask my that question, and I can't answer it, for me it just feel right to ship them (sorry for this childish answer). I hope maybe that you can give me the answer, Hamliet (if you don't mind). Why do you ship other couples in MDZS but it feels right (your writings clearly show it)....

And also are you friends with @mercyandmagic, hamliet? Sorry for this random question, is just that when I read both of your works, I can see the differences but it also feels familiar(?) Again sorry if I'm wrong in any way....Hope you have a wonderful day....

<3 <3 <3 Thank you! You're very kind.

First of all, yes, @mercyandmagic is a dear friend of mine... and she is also my identical twin sister! Haha. We are both adults who don't live together and have our own lives now, but we definitely share some tastes in fiction and occasionally brainstorm with one another.

As for MDZS, well, shipping is a thing in all stories between characters who offer interesting stories together or those with emotional energy. But much like with TGCF, I'd say there's subtext with less plausible deniability than should be there if it was intended to be platonic between three couples:

Lan Xichen and Jin Guangyao (it is explicitly paralleled to not just Wangxian, but the Lan brothers' mother and father)

Song Lan and Xiao Xingchen

Xue Yang and Xiao Xingchen

Of note, in an interview I believe MXTX even stated that the Yi City characters were originally their own story she came up with a few years prior to writing MDZS, and honestly you can kind of tell even though they are incorporated well. That to me seems again to pretty clearly indicate that both Songxiao and Xuexiao are not intended to be just platonic bffs.

Zhuiling I also really like as a ship, but I think that's just more for the potential of the next generation: the two juniors who are most fleshed out as characters are Lan Sizhui and Jin Ling, and both of them offer challenges to the other in terms of facing their pasts (with Sizhui being a Wen) and in terms of their personalities.

I'll add that despite MXTX again saying she only does one couple, she does make an exception in SVSSS... but Moshang is hilariously, while I adore it and ship it, not the couple with the most "r u sure" subtext in the main novel itself. That's Shen Jiu and Yue Qingyuan, whom I also consider to have pretty hard-to-deny subtext to them.

[winepresswrath]

What are your thoughts on Zhuiling? I love the ship dynamic (the grumpy, short-tempered one, always making a fuss × the calm, matured one, sweetest boi alive™ - very much like Xicheng lol) but....they're cousins.... And I know some might argue saying they're not actually related by blood but like. Neither are Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian. If you consider those two as brothers then you have to acknowledge that they are cousins. You can't just pick one.

I don't really ship the juniors, and if I was going to ship the juniors I wouldn't be into Zhuiling, but why should that stop me from inflicting my thoughts on the internet at large when I have an opinion that will probably annoy everyone?

Jin Ling and Sizhui are children who were born into mess and then raised in a broader context of yet more mess. It's not that they're not biologically related, it's that they're not biologically related and also were raised apart from each other in ignorance of the multiple layers of unofficial adoption and secretly fake disownment that potentially tied them together. If you meet a cute boy as a teenager, develop a crush on him, and then find out that for about a year of his early childhood he was being raised by your dead mother's estranged foster brother (who she and your uncle loved very much and she explicitly considered to be her brother, but you were raised to think of primarily as your father's murderer), the cute boy in question has no memory of this because of fever induced early childhood amnesia, and then it turns out that said estranged maybe-uncle is dating a man who "acted as father and older brother" to the cute boy, that is simply not your problem. That is your uncle's problem, your other uncle's problem, and your prospective uncle-in-law's problem. If you and the cute boy feel it would be appropriate, under the circumstances, to consider each other cousins that's awesome and adorable. If you decide that doesn't feel right to you and you'd rather suck face, that's also fine. If you're living in some fantasy version of ancient China where (please correct me if I'm wrong, I am not an expert) it was in many times and places considered totally fine to date your mom's brother's kids, you can presumably do both if you really want to! But seriously Jin Ling and Sizhui have no obligation to live their lives in accordance with feelings a bunch of messy adults are barely capable of articulating to themselves. As far as we know Wei Wuxian has never told Sizhui out loud with his words he considers him a son! Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian have not officially conveyed to each other that they consider each other brothers! If they were too cousinish for you personally to enjoy the relationship that would be very valid and I would certainly not say you should engage with a ship that grosses you out, but as that is not the case... why wouldn't you just enjoy your ship?

[hesselives]

Chapters: 5/5 Fandom: 魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù, 陈情令 | The Untamed (TV) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Jīn Líng | Jīn Rúlán/Lán Yuàn | Lán Sīzhuī, Lán Huàn | Lán Xīchén/Mèng Yáo | Jīn Guāngyáo, Lán Yuàn | Lán Sīzhuī & Wēn Níng | Wēn Qiónglín, Jīn Líng | Jīn Rúlán & Lán Jǐngyí & Lán Yuàn | Lán Sīzhuī Characters: Jīn Líng | Jīn Rúlán, Lán Huàn | Lán Xīchén, Lán Yuàn | Lán Sīzhuī, Xuē Yáng | Xuē Chéngměi, Mèng Yáo | Jīn Guāngyáo, Lán Jǐngyí, Sòng Lán | Sòng Zǐchēn, Xiǎo Xīngchén Additional Tags: Future Fic, Case Fic, Adult Juniors, Reincarnated Meng Yao, Genderswap, Established Relationship, Necromancy, Ghosts, Curses, Canon-Typical Violence, MDZS-canon mostly, Some CQL, Jin Ling has too many uncles, Possession, Trigger Warning: Xue Yang, past xue yang/xiao xingchen, background wangxian - Freeform, Justice For The Yi City Crew Series: Part 2 of A Troublesome Charge Summary:

Sixteen years after the death of Jin Guangyao, the newly elected Chief Cultivator Jin Rulan arrives at the Cloud Recesses with an injured arm, thirty armed disciples, and desperate need for back-up.

Some spirits just won't stay dead.

+

bamf!zhuiling + best-corpse wen ning + snarky conniving xue yang

(the entire “troublesome charge” series is wonderful, but this part is my favorite.)

[sevildea]

A :)

A - Ships that you currently like a lot. (They don’t have to be OTPs because not everyone has OTPs.) Friendships, pairings, threesomes, etc. are allowed

To answer shortly: HuaLian(TGCF), ZhuiLing(MDZS), MoShang(SVSSS), Soukoku(BSD), GureShin(Owari no Seraph)

To elaborate:

HuaLian: I know that it is basically the motto of the fandom that “HuaLian created love” and yes, they did. Their dynamic is just simply so balanced, they complete each other: the God that has only one worshipper left and the Ghost King whose only purpose in life is to protect and show his god that he is worthy of love and care. He waited 800 years to finally approach the one person he admired the most and he had the powers to protect him. I feel like they are the most realistic out of all the main couples in the MXTX novels, mostly because both of them are functional adults (yes they are) and their relationship is built on the mutual trust and respect they have for the other. Catch me in the corner to cry about HuaLian any hour of any day. 

ZhuiLing: While I really like WangXian, no matter how hard I try, I can’t push down the adoration of the form of purest love. ZhuiLing for me is like a refreshing little rest in the middle of a bumpy road. They have been through so much, yet they are still standing strong, not only for themselves, but the people around them. Jin Ling’s love and adoration for his parents - that he doesn’t even remember anymore - is heartbreaking, his whole existence just screams that he doesn’t know how to show his feelings and is awkward to act around people that he could call his friends. Sizhui is just the sweetheart that embraces this little broken hearted boy and fixes him, shows him the love that neither of them were truly shown before. The pure and clumsy first puppy love just sweeps me away. 

MoShang: The idiot writer and his ideal man in the form of an ice demon. They are both clueless idiots and I love them so much. Nuff said. (I just HC them to be a soft and cuddly couple, SQH enjoying his personal A/C and MBJ being happy that his lover is happy.)

Soukoku: Catch me screaming about height difference couples. Okay so this was the couple that actually got me so deep into fandom hell that you can’t even imagine. I love them because Chuuya is just a ball of anger towards Dazai, who is basically the only person that can make him act differently, make him fall out of his everyday routine of killing and death and break the spell of Chuuya feeling like a killing machine, because Dazai indirectly shows him that he still has his emotions. Calculating shithead x Smol, angry but strong boy. Good shit. 

GureShin: They just have had a special place in my heart for years now because of Shinya existing and being a soft boy. Guren is just someone that only looks at one person and chases after them, while Shinya has always stood behind him, supporting from the shadows wherever the other went. And I just simply adore the fact that he made Guren go from “I don’t need friends, fuck off” to “Hey, I basically destroyed the world for my friends”. 

I forced myself to only include one couple from each series, because I don’t want to put anyone through a whole post of me screaming about all the TGCF couples. Like, I ship them all. All. 

even though I might do a post like that later

[twistedappletree]

nah but Jin Ling and Fairy taking up like 95% of the bed and eventually pushing Lan Sizhui onto the floor in their sleep is so real 😭😭💀

[twistedappletree]

planning on doing a ‘cultivation partner’ story series for zhuiling where it’s just them as adults going on night hunts and investigations together as an established couple but i kinda wanna wait until ‘letters never sent’ is finished because that’s gonna be the fic that solidifies all my adult zhuiling headcanons and details how they become cultivation partners to begin with

[twistedappletree]

my problem lately is that i’ve been writing but not finishing anything so if anyone has ideas they wanna see written that can be made into a short ficlet/ask-fic, feel free to lmk

[twistedappletree]

@koiblossoms hi yes hello, you ordered angst? ✨

[twistedappletree]

i’ve written a fic from jin ling’s pov about his crush on lan sizhui but now i kind of wanna write one from LSZ’s pov since i tend to favor JL’s 👀🩵💛

[twistedappletree]

@koiblossoms i need you to know that I’m working rn but I got your ask/zhuiling idea and it honestly NEEDS to be its own fic like this is more than just a short ask-ficlet, it’s fueled me. I’m gonna write this for you. Actually I already started writing it bc I’m so excited lmaooo THANK YOU 🌸✨💕

[wangxianficrecs]

❤️Attempting the Impossible

by Ariaste

T, 36k, jiang cheng & wei wuxian, wangxian, background zhuiling

Summary:  Jiang Cheng gathers up his determination in both hands and goes to the Cloud Recesses to embark on one of the most difficult endeavors he can imagine: Repairing his relationship with his brother.

To his surprise, he discovers he's become an uncle again... several times over.

Wei Wuxian, what the fuck?!

My comments:  In which Jiang Cheng, motivating himself to reconnect with his only family... discovers that he’s got FAR more family than he’d thought.  (Witness Jiang Cheng’s bumbling attempts to communicate with adults, fabulous avuncular powers, and shamelessly petty blackmailing of his oldest nephew.)  This is a family romp, and it’s utterly adorable.  Each of the kids has a very strong personality.

Now enjoy far too many excerpts, because this story was chock full of laugh-out-loud gems.

Excerpt 1:  Lan Chun blows carefully on her tea to cool it, sips a little, makes a little squirm of happiness, and says again, “You’re from Yunmeng!”

“Yes,” Jiang Cheng says. “I am the Sect Leader.”

“Wow!” She beams at him. “I’ve met three sect leaders, you’re the fourth! Do you know Zewu-jun? He comes to see us every month--he’s the leader of the Gusu Lan sect,” she adds helpfully, as if he doesn’t fucking know that, even though he is a grownup sitting in the middle of the Cloud Recesses guest house , drinking their tea. But kids just talk like that sometimes when they want to show you that they know that information, so he says nothing. “And I’ve met Sect Leader Jin of Lanling, who is ten whole years older than me, I did the math all by myself, I’m very good at math--”

“A-Chun, arrogance is forbidden,” Lan Hao whispers to her.

“It’s not arrogant to say I’m good at math! I’m better than you are, er-ge! And I’ve met Sect Leader Ouyang, because he’s Ouyang-gege’s dad, and Ouyang-gege comes to visit da-ge sometimes. And now I’ve met you. What’s Yunmeng like? Did you bring lotus seeds? Do you like them? I like them. Can I see your sword? Can you fly on your sword? Did you bring your whip? Can I see that? Have you ever used your whip to decapitate somebody ? I think you should try decapitating somebody with your whip, because that would be cool .”

Shit. He hasn’t ever used the whip to decapitate somebody, but that would be cool. Fuck. He sips his tea sternly. “Ask one question at a time.”

Excerpt 2:  “Wei Wuxian!” he snaps. “How dare you? Are you disowning me?”

“Eh?” Wei Wuxian has half pulled out of Jiang Cheng’s grip, but at this he pauses, alarmed.

“I’m your brother!” Jiang Cheng shouts at him. “Are you a moron? You can’t impose? What impose? I’m family, there’s no such thing as imposing on family!”

Wei Wuxian gives him a stricken look and goes red in the face. “Listen, you don’t--”

“I come all this way, I discover out of the blue that I’ve got seven nieces and nephews that you didn’t tell me about, I find out that there’s a giant demon boar that can knock over trees wandering around near your house, and you’re declining my help just to be fucking polite? What’s the matter with you!”

“We can handle it ourselves!” Wei Wuxian objects. “It’s only one giant demon boar! Between me and Sizhui, it’ll be fine! We can take care of it!”

“Just because you can doesn’t mean you have to,” Jiang Cheng snarls. “I’m not leaving. Go tell Hanguang-jun. Ask him if he wants me to stay here or go fetch the components for you.”

And with that he sits back down facing the path, crosses his arms, and glares into the woods as if that could make the giant demon boar menacing his family turn around and wander somewhere else.

Excerpt 3:  She pouts, looking eerily like Wei Wuxian even though it’s both physically and temporally impossible for her to be his blood daughter. She recovers just as swiftly. “So how’d you make her sleep, huh?”

“I recited tongue twisters."

“Aren’t your arms already getting sore?”

He shifts Her Ladyship a little, very carefully so as not to wake her up, and shakes his head. “I’m strong. It’s from decapitating so many people with my whip.”

Wei Wuxian snorts, covering his mouth with his hand, but A-Chun’s big eyes go even wider. “Wow! Really?”

“Absolutely,” he says gravely.

Excerpt 4:  “He has a boyfriend,” Jiang Cheng says, aggrieved. The stern uncle aesthetic is not going to be much fun if no one’s going to take him seriously. ... “It’s Jin Ling.”

This makes Wei Wuxian open his eyes and turn on his back, frowning at the ceiling. Finally! Success!

“Hm,” says Wei Wuxian. “On one hand, what good taste, going after shijie’s son. On the other hand, what poor taste, going after Jin Zixuan’s son.” He shrugs and curls back around the cushions. “Can’t be helped. Lans all have wretched taste. If it’s not noisy and embarrassing and, preferably, a murderer, they don’t want it.” Without opening his eyes, he raises one finger philosophically and says, “That’s what happens when you’re a repressed bunch of virgins. But well done, Sizhui, picking a boy who’s only fifty percent a total disaster. Lan Zhan did such a good job raising him. Gonna kiss him about that when he gets back."

****

I made a list of the kids, so I could keep them sorted: Lan Yuan (Sizhui, M, 19) • Lan Shu (Siyuan, F, 11) • Lan Hao (Sixia, M, 9) • Lan Chun (Sihan, F, 7) • Lan Ding (Siyue, F, 5) • Lan Que (Siyong, M, 2) • Lan Ying (Siqing, F, baby)

post canon, humor, reconciliation, brotherly feels, accidental baby acquisition, adoption, adopted children, lan wangji is a good dad, wei wuxian is a good dad, jiang cheng’s avuncular powers, jiang cheng POV, family feels, fluff, kid fic, family drama, light angst, adorable juniors, not the usual group, jiang cheng needs a hug, REALLY BADLY, self worth issues, this is a not-at-all-disguised Family Romp, giant demon boar, lan sizhui is the best boy, and also a schemer, feel good fic, comfort fic, favorite, @ariaste

(You may wish to REBLOG as a signal boost for this author if you like – or think others might like – this story.)

[ibijau]

For the wip game: colorful, content, callouses, comb, ceremony, cure. At least one should work, yeah?

They get to burn colourful paper money and to organise a little party of sorts at an inn, without any adult supervision, too.

A/A zhuiling, even if that’s not a very thrilling sentence, sorry XD

After all, Jin Guangyao himself had seemed content as he took the three bows, and he always spoke highly of Qin Su.

sangyao + xisang

“Elegant you certainly are,” Nie Huaisang had pointed out as he adjusted a pretty comb in her hair, “but you’ll never be petite and delicate, and you don’t need to be.”

a planned continuation of that one fem!lxc/nhs fic

It was, in all honesty, a rather pitiful wedding ceremony.

sangyao + xisang

There’s thick billowing fog, there’s fierce corpses, half their group gets poisoned, Mo Xuanyu tricks them into eating the worst food they’ve ever tasted by calling it a cure… Lan Sizhui isn’t one to complain (it is against the rules) but he comes very, very close a few times.

A/A zhuiling