#except jiao

[yume-x-hanabi]

😭😭😭

[omgpurplefattie]

MLC WIP Wednesday

This is still from my cat café AU, a crack fic where everybody except Li Lianhua and Jiao Liqiao are cats.

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

The cat flap on the end of the tiny spiral staircase that led up to Li Lianhua's never used private balcony would only admit Huli-jing, Xiaobao, or A-Fei; it was set to the RFID chips of the two younger cats, and the tag on A-Fei's collar. Li Lianhua knew that is was deeply irrational, but after what had happened, he never wanted to implant anything electronic into A-Fei again. It was stupid — without a chip, Li Lianhua wouldn't even be able to prove this was his cat if A-Fei was ever abducted, a fear was not entirely irrational.

The reason for that fear was the last person whose order Li Lianhua had on his tray right now, a very beautiful young woman who worked at a nearby ad agency and who often spent her afternoons at the cat café working at her newest model Mac without any interruption from the usual office drama. Li Lianhua had heard her devoted interns call her Jiao-jie whenever one of them was given the great privilege to come along, and that was the only name he had for her. She used it on all her personal socials, too.

She had ordered a chai latte with four extra espressos in it. She had tried for six, but Li Lianhua had insisted that he did not poison his guests; also, it would taste atrocious. He brought an entire bottle of Ty Nant with it, free of charge — he really did not want her to either suffer a heart attack, or suddenly hatch a crazy plan for world domination that would implicate A-Fei.

Why she was so enamoured with A-Fei was anybody's guess. Her Instagram was full of admittedly excellent pictures of him, and she brought him incredibly expensive dried salmon snacks that she made sure no other cat got a share of, not even poor Bijoux who liked her even more than she liked A-Fei. Bijoux, a very pretty Holy Birma who had come from a hoarding case disguised as breeding facility, now lay purring next to her very pointy Louboutins as usual.

Li Lianhua served Jiao-jie her weaponized chai, and her free water, and then bent to drop a few of the official cat treats for Bijoux. Sometimes, he was allowed to lounge in Jiao-jie's lap; then, he was the happiest cat in all the world.

A-Fei kept his distance as usual.

[presumenothing]

not in possession of the correct set of braincells to write this at the moment but. au where:

li xiangyi returns to the jianghu not as li lianhua but instead

as the new leader of jinyuan alliance

(wardrobe change not required but recommended)

(this of course is predicated on him taking di feisheng's word that I Didn't Shoot The Deputy Your Shixiong

and/or already knowing it by virtue of time travel, which is a plot variation that would definitely also work)

like, we do already know that di-mengzhu doesn't actually care much for, y'know, all that mafia stuff. guy just wants a fight

(and to keep li xiangyi alive. part of the HR agreement probably)

li xiangyi, on the other hand, has Things To Do that requires considerable manpower to be doing it with. win-win situation!

[qilingxiong]

jiao liqiao with her speech about how she was jealous of di feisheng's twelve female guardians because they took his attention away from her and just. girl. i guarantee you one hundred percent that di feisheng was not flirting with any of them more than he does you. he has the same level of attraction to every woman and that level is a complete and thorough zero. he just thought they were neat ok

[mstrchu]

never not thinking about how the jie dao disciples on the shang side during fengshen were almost all old and already accomplished figures with well-established posts and reputations while a solid chunk of the chan dao disciples on the zhou/west qi side were like. a group of freshly traumatized kids and yang jian, who was also traumatized but just slightly older.

like pov: you're a shang general and your opponents are a group of middle/high schoolers and their exhausted college student TA.

[dany36]

man that nachtigal arc was really weak. We saw him once before the battle at the palace and we got a bit of background from rowen that he and nachtigal fought together in war ages ago. Was I supposed to feel sorry for him or rowen after killing nachtigal? Cus I felt nothing 🥱 like…next!!!!

[ryin-silverfish]

For those not familiar with the Chinese Studio book, could you please name the fox spirits that appear in the book?

That is...quite a monumental task, because there are so many of them! Like, more than 80 out of 500+ short stories. As such, I'll just list the foxes I like the most.

Feng Sanniang - the one and only lesbian fox of Liaozhai, who falls in love with Fan Shiyi Niang (who is implied to feel the same way), yet can't get together with her for obvious reasons, and settles on finding a good husband for her crush instead.

When Shiyi Niang's family objected to the marriage and forced her into suicide, Feng Sanniang revives her, reunites her with her husband, and...has her cultivation ruined when said man slept with her while she was drunk.

No seriously, what. After that, she reveals she is a fox and falls in love with Shiyi Niang at first sight, but alas, staying with her would only cause more suffering for both of them, before leaving forever.

Ying Ning - not a full fox, but the daughter of a human and a fox, raised by a ghostly granny. Babygirl. Like, she's just so cute in the first half of the story. Yet she isn't completely naive and innocent, and the subtle stepford smiler implication is...really sad.

Hong Yu - the bro-est of foxes. She starts dating in secret with a scholar, gets yelled at by said scholar's dad for violating laws of propriety, settles on being a wingman and giving enough money to her boyfriend to marry another woman before leaving.

However, the scholar's marriage was soon torn apart by a corrupt official forcing his wife to be a concubine; in return, his wife committed suicide and his father died of grief and rage.

Then a nameless vigilante killed the corrupt official, and the scholar was arrested because of it. During the arrest, his young son was forcefully separated from him and went missing, and when he was finally released, he had lost everything except his house.

But suddenly, Hong Yu showed up with his son! She had saved the kid and raised him while the scholar was in jail, and through her subsequent labor, the family was restored to prosperity.

Lian Xiang - the fox in the human-fox-ghost love triangle. "She's just bad for you, dear, literally. Like, she is a ghost and sleeping with her will slowly kill you. But alright, if you insist, I'll heal you after her visits."

The love triangle gets resolved in a fox-human-ghost polycule, but not without the involvement of possession and Lian Xiang getting reincarnated into a human body.

The Ugly Fox - nameless, except for the fact that she was very ugly. Her story is also extremely catharthic. Essentially, she paid this Mu guy to sleep with her, his family got rich as a result, and he repaid her by employing an exorcist and drawing talismans on his mansion gate to keep her out.

She was rightfully pissed, demanded all her money back, beat up the exorcist, then unleashed a little sharp-toothed critter on Mu that bit off two of his toes, which finally forced him to give up the money.

At which point she took her money, left, remarried another peasant in the nearby village, and built her new family into a wealthy and powerful one.

Jiao Na - your typical human-fox love story, except the human, Kong, sacrificed just as much for the fox, stepping up to save her family from the divine thunderbolts and dying in the process.

(Here, the divine thunderbolts aren't of the "retribution" variety, sent only against foxes that engage in harmful cultivation. It is the more generic "peril" variety, something all yaoguais must survive because their cultivation is inherently against the natural order.)

She, in turn, resurrected him by delivering a red pill (implied to be her inner core) into his mouth via a kiss, and they lived happily ever after——even though Kong already had a wife, who was Jiao Na's cousin and also a fox.

...Like I said, there are so, so many more fox spirits in Liaozhai, and even though Pu Songling was still beholden to the standards of his times (thus the foxes often resigning themselves to wingman or concubine status), his fox girls still managed to be lively, unique characters.

[semisolidmind]

What if after Peaches has her 8 kids she gets killed by the celestial realm or something, and there's nothing the Sun family can do but wait for their mother/wife to be reincarnated, which leads to the whole 'Monkey King meeting his Peaches again after hundreds of years due to MK' situation? How would that situation change with the babies being around, desperate to see their mama?

Sorry for the multiple asks! Feel free to ignore them if it's too much or uninteresting.

oh man. that'd be an awkward family reunion, considering she won't remember any of them.

also the destruction wukong would cause to the celestial realm after they murk his wife? astronomical. and his first three kids are old enough by then to join in, and they do so eagerly.

so to start, the sun kids are all basically grown by the time wukong finds mk, with seventh and eighth being around ten years old in demon age. the siblings more or less welcome the new addition with open arms, though some more than others.

mk grows up surrounded by siblings, and oddly enough, is better adjusted socially because of it? while the influence of some of them may be questionable (cough second third fifth cough), for the most part his family is his safe place. he'd probably be a smidgen less dependent on his friends because of it. he's also less defensive and scared than the version of him without siblings.

however, the subject of their mama is one that mk is woefully left out of. he never got to meet the original reader, and his siblings (except hua and chāo, who were a bit too small to remember her clearly) don't talk about her much. mk has gotten jūn and zíhào to talk about her a little bit, but da xia just gets defensive and refuses to entertain the subject. xīnyi also deflects whenever reader comes up. the only ones willing to give mk any sort of backstory are jiāo hui and xuě fēng. those two, along with hua and chāo, are his closest friends.

in the case of mk going to the human world, i imagine wukong being slightly less reluctant to let mk go, if only because he knows that jūn, jiao hui, and xuě fēng hang around the city as well, so mk would have support. wukong would still make mandatory home visits though, since he knows his kids might not be telling him the whole truth when they report on their baby brother.

as for the event of meeting reader; wukong almost cries, seeing her again. his first interaction with her new incarnation is...softer, more subdued. reader feels a little bad for him. he seems so withdrawn, he must miss his son. she's less suspicious of him because of his attitude.

wukong doesn't know what to tell his children. their mother is reborn, but she isn't their mother anymore. she won't know any of them. he doesn't want to put them through the pain of seeing her if she can't greet each of them knowing who they are.

however.

there might be a way to reawaken his wife and mother of his children. she still exists in the soul inhabiting this new body, he just needs to bring her back to the forefront of their consciousness. he'll tear apart heaven and earth looking for a way.

cue angst and fear, and a fun time for mk trying to keep reader a secret from his more volatile siblings. zíhào, da xia, and xīnyi would likely just kidnap reader for their father if they knew, thinking, similarly to him, that they can bring back the spirit of their mother.

also, macaque has been freed by now (it may or may not have been jūn and xuě fēng who removed the seal on his mountain), and is close friends with reader. in this case, jūn warns macaque of his father's plan to try and bring back the previous reader, so he has more time to plan on how he's gonna save her.

macaque has missed the smile on reader's face, her jokes, her sass...she's much like she was when they were on the journey together. he doesn't want her new, free incarnation to have to live as a prisoner to the monkey king's sick idea of love.

he failed her all those centuries ago. he won't fail her again.

....

(also, the reason none of the other kids can weild a magic staff, but mk can; half humanity. at least that's what wukong figures it is. his kids are all almost as strong as him, so that can't be why they can't lift it. must be magical bullshit, he thinks.)

[mademoiselle-red]

Jiao Liqiao 🤝 Li Xiangyi/Lianhua, a completely unserious list

Stabs Di Feisheng

Poisons Di Feisheng to seal his inner power using ancient Nanyin techniques

Causes Di Feisheng near fatal injuries

Takes Di Feisheng home and tries to keep him there

Wants to be Di Feisheng’s “owner” (主人）

Feeds Di Feisheng

Descendants of the Nanyin royal family

Share the same wedding room with Di Feisheng (with vastly different consequences)

Get to be Di Feisheng’s “exceptions” (with vastly different consequences)

[the-monkey-ruler]

I am not familiar with the rules so I am curious (I love reading all your explanations so much), what are the rules in the underworld? Can everyone just go there? or is Sun Wukong an exception? Like, is death permanent for the demons/gods/mortals alike? Or is there some process they have to go through to be rebirth? Because I am wondering if (this is like speculation/headcanon) there was ever a chance for Erlang's older brother to be reborn/rebirth, or if Erlang had ever thought of going down the underworld to find him? I am so interested in the Yang Siblings, because despite not being there, I love that Yang Jiao haunts both of his siblings, like being known as Second Son and Third Sister feels like a reminder that they had an older brother, haha.

I am not familiar with the rules so I am curious (I love reading all your explanations so much), what are the rules in the underworld?

Actually funny enough someone gave a GREAT explanation of the death/rebirth process and what that would look like to an average person! @ryin-silverfish made a wonderful comprehensible and walk-through guide of what dying and going through rebirth are like for normal human beings and what they are most likely to see.

Can everyone just go there?

It sounds like you are more asking if people that are alive and are planning to stay alive can go to the underworld?

Normally for most humans, this isn't the case as the only way for a mortal to go to the underworld is to die. As for Immortals or gods then they would have the Walking Cloud (at the very least) and should be able to physically go to the underworld however I don't see most deities doing so without at least some cause or permission. The underworld is run like a business/branch of government/etc. so if a deity goes there and just gets in the way then that could still be rude. In short, I can see deities CAN go but if they don't have a reason then it would be better if they stay out of the way.

or is Sun Wukong an exception?

Sun Wukong is always the exception. He is different from most and if not all deities as he is shown to move and travel anywhere without fear of repercussions. Wukong goes to the underworld because he KNOWS he can and knows that no one can stop him even if he holds other deities' duties to do so. Wukong has no qualms about having others be inconvenienced for his sake and shows this well when he goes to the underworld multiple times in the journey to recruit people's help. It isn't... proper to say the least but Wukong never let social etiquette stop him from completing his goals. I doubt any other deities would have the gall but Wukong has the power to back up his boldness so no one really stops him.

Like, is death permanent for the demons/gods/mortals alike?

"Permanent" isn't really... permanent so to speak. If we are talking about general yao/deities/mortals then all things have a soul and eventually, these souls are all trapped in the wheel of reincarnation. The only beings that are outside of this trap are the Buddha (hence Wukong reaching his goal for true immorality/freedom at the end). There are different details depending on which dynasty lore you might be looking at but all beings are still bound by reincarnation and can still die.

Mortals normally die as such with old age or being killed and thus they go back to the underworld, get evaluated, and go through the incarnation process after their memory is wiped.

Yao are just spirits that skip their human cycle and try to cheat in their animal/object life. If you don't know how yao work read this and understand that Yao are just animals/objects that cultivate to get a humanoid form. Once they die/killed their souls go back into the cycle and either pay for the karma by one of the judges, or they are reincarnated back into their animal/object form to properly life out their lives until they get enough karma to be a human. Or maybe they were a good enough Yao and can be a human in their next life.

Deities while immortal can still be killed. I've seen in Journey to the South how some deities can even use reincarnation to avoid being arrested by heaven by being reborn as someone else and still retaining their past life's memories. This is illegal as you SHOULD have your memory wiped before you are reborn but it can happen if a person goes through other means. But in most cases, if a deity is 'killed' then they would most likely go to the underworld, live out their good karma in a paradise and then be reborn in a very good life. Usually, when I see deities being sent into the reincarnation cycle it is usually a punishment and they will eventually come back to heaven once they have earned their cultivation all over again. We see this with Tang Sanang who was the Golden Cicada who had to live through 10 lifetimes of pure lives to get back to where his cultivation needed to be. And we see this with Zhu Bajie who was reborn as a pig but turned into a yao as he kept his past life's cultivation.

Or is there some process they have to go through to be rebirth?

The process should be the same for everyone going through the judgment halls. But there are certainly a lot of cases of people coming back from the dead (like in FYSS) or mortals being deified after death when they are worshipped.

But normally mortals/yao/deities have their karma weighted and depending on their good/bad deeds they either be reborn into a life that is easy or one that is filled with struggles. If they are really bad then they are usually born as an animal/object as punishment until their next life to be a human to work for a better life. Hence why Yao tend to cheat and skip to the humanoid form so they don't have to live out their lives as animals/objects.

Because I am wondering if (this is like speculation/headcanon) there was ever a chance for Erlang's older brother to be reborn/rebirth, or if Erlang had ever thought of going down the underworld to find him?

Yang Jaio would have been reborn certainly as that is the process all mortals go through.

However, by the time Erlang got his own cultivation/enough power to fight the Jade Emporer, I personally think that Yang Jaio would have been reincarnated and forget all his past life. Erlang could certainly go to the underworld and perhaps ask about his brother's next life but at that point this wouldn't be the brother he would know and would be someone with his soul but not his memories.

He could still go and look but depending on if Erlang would want the weight of knowledge knowing who his brother would be and living out hundreds of mortals' lives might be exhausting.

I am so interested in the Yang Siblings, because despite not being there, I love that Yang Jiao haunts both of his siblings, like being known as Second Son and Third Sister feels like a reminder that they had an older brother, haha.

This is a personal headcanon of my own because I love the Yang siblings but I always liked to think that Yang Jiao got reborn as the Howling Sky Dog so that he was always by his brother's side even after death.

[eirenical]

Things Left Behind (1280 words) by eirenical

Summary:

Yun Biqiu has brought his mistress a gift. It may be tattered and torn, but it's still oh, so much fun to play with, and Jiao Liqiao enjoys little more than a brand new toy.

Jiao Liqiao ran a hand down the crossed fabric of Li Xiangyi's robes. The material was thin. Rough. Poor quality. Several layers deep to make up for its lack of weight. And it was stained almost as red as her own now. She turned to the man standing beside her and clicked her teeth. "Such a shame, Biqiu. Do you always deliver presents in such damaged condition?"

Yun Biqiu bent nearly double in his bow to her—more, some would argue, than was her due, but she would never deny a useful tool the right to venerate her as he saw fit. "My apologies. I was careless."

Jiao Liqiao turned back to Li Xiangyi and ran her hands down the center line of his robes once more, pausing only when she reached his belt. As she started picking apart the closure, Biqiu shifted beside her, his unease rolling out into the room like the smell of rotting fruit. She pulled the belt from Li Xiangyi's waist and started slowly peeling back the many layers until she'd reached his innermost garments. Biqiu's tension was palpable, now, like an itch against her skin. Eventually she snapped, "Go and fetch a basin of water and a cloth."

Continue reading on AO3

Notes, tags, detailed warnings, and other fic info beneath the cut.

September 1, 2024: This idea has been kicking around my head ever since I noticed that the robes that Li Xiangyi is wearing when Biqiu stabs him in Episode 36 are not the ones he's wearing when he wakes up in the dungeon in episode 37. Someone must have undressed and redressed him while he was unconscious. So I've decided the someone was Jiao Liqiao and let her have a little fun. 😏

Detailed Warnings: As implied by the tags, Li Lianhua is unconscious through the entire fic and thus can't consent to anything that's going on (thus the tags).

In terms of what Jiao Liqiao actually does to him, it's mostly touching him nonsexually, undressing him, digging her fingers into his stab wound, and one kiss towards the end.

She is however, planning to do quite a bit more once he's awake and that is apparent in her thoughts throughout the fic.

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: 莲花楼 | Mysterious Lotus Casebook (TV) Rating: Mature Warnings: Rape/Non-Con Relationships: Jiao Liqiao/Li Lianhua | Li Xiangyi Characters: Jiao Liqiao, Li Lianhua | Li Xiangyi, Yun Biqiu Additional Tags: Non-Consensual Somnophilia, (mostly touching nothing overtly sexual except in jiao-jie's thoughts), Captivity, Torture, Wound Play, Undressing, Dressing, Treating Someone Like a Doll, Rape/Non-con Elements, Unconsciousness

[kseniyagreen]

I find it remarkable and regrettable, although completely understandable, that the drama shows in flashback the story of everyone's acquaintance - everyone! - heroes except Li Xiangyi and Di Feisheng .

Despite the fact that before the start of the story they have at least two important scenes, which are mentioned only in the retelling.

The first was when Li Xiangyi wanted to execute Jiao Liqiao, but Di Feisheng stopped him. But since then, according to Jiao Liqiao herself, he has completely distanced himself from her.

The second is when Li Xiangyi and Di Feisheng enter into an alliance. How did they get from first to second? What made Li Xiangyi trust Di Feisheng despite the opinions of everyone around him?

I think their backstory deserves a separate series.

But it is also completely clear why these scenes were not shown to us. If this was their “divorce”,

then everything that happened between them before would never have passed censorship

[qilingxiong]

duel meta

i think a good aspect of the conflict present in the donghai fight is the fact that li xiangyi and di feisheng are each seeing the other as representing incompatible things, and this isn't something that began with the duel but it was part of what doomed them by the end of it.

it has to do with how both of them view their places in the jianghu, in general. li xiangyi by this point has become the symbol of sigumen. he embodies everything it stands for, and by extension of sigumen's prestige, he embodies what those in the jianghu striving for righteousness should look like. he's the legend of both this generation and the next, and when he snaps at shan gudao, li xiangyi literally considers himself the beating heart of sigumen. without him, it can't exist. he has become one with every person he represents while still apart from them, embedded in this fame across the jianghu and all its eyes on him. it's a burden, but while he's placed on the pedestal, li xiangyi still attempts to do good by all who put him on it. so here he stands, trying to shoulder it all.

di feisheng, on the other hand, has always seen his position on an individual level. he's associated with jinyuanmeng and he built it, yes, but that power is not something he's thrown himself into as its leader. he wouldn't say that jinyuanmeng wouldn't exist if he was gone; once di feisheng is reinstated as mengzhu in the present day, the first thing he does is to hand it over to jiao liqiao. his actions throughout the story after that are largely separate from those of jinyuanmeng, and he makes little effort to involve his subordinates except for a few specific people. to di feisheng, his achievements and strength ultimately rest on himself as a swordsman, and his skill compared to other distinguished people at the top of the jianghu. we see that on the night he frees jiao liqiao. he's not here to take over forces or resources, he's just here for one man and the rank he holds.

(i would argue that the power di feisheng did accumulate through jinyuanmeng is for two reasons. one, so that he had enough people behind him to apparently rival li xiangyi, and two, to keep him safe from the di mansion. but that's a different topic.)

so when the war between sigumen and jinyuanmeng breaks out, its final act on the donghai ship is a standoff between two people: one who views himself as representing a collective, and another who considers himself in that moment a swordsman on his own. and this greatly influences how both of them treat that fight.

to li xiangyi, this is a duel contextualized by leadership. because he will take the responsibility for sigumen and his side of the fight, he's focusing all that grief over shan gudao, all that anger and blame on di feisheng alone, as the opposing head of the forces he's been clashing with. since the name of li xiangyi cannot be separated from sigumen (and by now i don't think li xiangyi could define himself as person from image even if he tried), now he attaches di feisheng to jinyuanmeng in his attempt to force him to take accountability. in li xiangyi's eyes, they're really not people in this duel. they're the faces of hundreds more warriors, and every move they make has the lives of those people hanging onto them.

to di feisheng, the fact that they stand alone on that ship means they are alone, cut loose from everyone and everything else in an isolated space. this is a fight in its purest form now. just two men and their blades, relying on their own physical/spiritual strength and nothing else. it's what di feisheng has been waiting for, this chance to challenge li xiangyi where both of them stand on truly equal ground. there is no sigumen or jinyuanmeng dragging them down. they've cut through all the noise of the jianghu that he doesn't care for, and they're just di feisheng and li xiangyi, two highly skilled people who get to see who's stronger in an environment no one else can influence.

(it's worth noting, i think, that di feisheng chose the location of the duel by situating himself and therefore li xiangyi who would find him out at sea, even though the majority of their forces were fighting on land. his men on the ship complained about how horrid a decision it was to be at sea in that weather (it's the first dialogue of the show), but this ensured that any outside/not predetermined interference during their head-to-head would be much more difficult.)

these views or motivations are so terribly at odds with each other. li xiangyi is fighting out of desperate rage and the need for retribution, weighed down more than ever by all the people who look up to him and depend on him to seek justice. di feisheng is fighting for fairly-won status and glory, and in his eyes, for the first time they have been granted the freedom to go against one another where nothing else needs to matter.

it shows in the moves both of them choose to make. namely, that di feisheng fights with more restraint, while li xiangyi fights quite viciously. i'm going to focus a bit more on di feisheng's role here, because i think this contrast on his part is interesting and works to subvert his initial reputation/image, something significant to his character throughout the show (or at least more than it is for li xiangyi).

i would argue that di feisheng is on the defensive for the majority of this fight, as his side has been this entire war. in the duel choreography he's blocking, dodging, or backing up a significant amount more than li xiangyi, who keeps pressing, launching new offenses wherever possible to search for an answer and revenge. there's a clear give and take between them as the fight progresses. and thanks to how this dynamic plays out, and with the background of these characters' motivations, there are three key pauses in the duel that stand out to me. they're all points where di feisheng could have moved on or killed li xiangyi, even as he was the one being attacked, but chose not to.

the first is when li xiangyi is pressed up against the ship wall, di feisheng's sword against li xiangyi's cheek, enough to cut but not enough to lethally wound. they're locked in this position for a good few seconds before either of them react. di feisheng could press forward and cleave his skull, since li xiangyi can't parry him. i couldn't get a good screenshot, but shaoshi is buried in di feisheng's shoulder here. for that di feisheng could also back up and away, given his injury. but he does neither. instead he freezes in place, doing nothing until li xiangyi draws his blade out of di feisheng, and makes the next move.

the second is when there's a lull in the action on the roof of the ship cabin. we get di feisheng's line “一个剑客不该有弱点” ("a swordsman shouldn't have weaknesses") and li xiangyi pausing as the bicha poison begins to take effect. this is another very long break where di feisheng could've taken advantage of li xiangyi being distracted, but he stands still. we learn later that he didn't even know li xiangyi had been poisoned then, so this isn't him dramatically pausing to revel in li xiangyi's pain. his opponent wasn't immersed in the fight, so di feisheng waited until he was. he only moves forward to meet him when li xiangyi chooses to.

these breaks turn the duel into a dance, almost, where di feisheng is letting li xiangyi lead and only moving with him (when they're both in the physical state to). he's fighting with too much respect and leniency to be out for blood the way li xiangyi is, with everyone else on that ship already dead. they're fighting the duel through vastly different lenses and neither of them have realized it yet.

that point of realization is this last pause, di feisheng's blade stabbed into li xiangyi while he stands over him in the rain. the fact that di feisheng isn't actively trying to kill is apparent in two different details here. the first is that di feisheng's blade missed li xiangyi's heart, even though his accuracy as a swordsman is incredible. the second is that, once again, he waits until li xiangyi can move again before attempting to do anything further— except this time he yells that he's won.

this is the moment it genuinely struck for me that their perspectives on this duel are so different. di feisheng dealt li xiangyi a wound that is serious in the moment, but for someone of li xiangyi's strength, he'll be fine in the end. it only takes him out in the short term, and within that time, what di feisheng is waiting for after calling his victory is for li xiangyi to concede the duel. to say it's over, and give over his name as the top swordsman. that's what di feisheng was after.

to him, when it came to li xiangyi, defeating the man and killing him were two different things.

but this isn't where it all stops, because li xiangyi didn't know this (how could he?) and he's fighting for more than ensuring his name remains above anyone else's. di feisheng is fighting cold, but li xiangyi still has so much anger, so much left to do. so much at stake and on his shoulders and 'defeat' and 'giving up' are luxuries he doesn't have.

when the blade in him and the poison taking greater hold pushes li xiangyi into needing a last stand, he refuses to hold anything back. he's an opportunist now, and di feisheng has given him an opening. so out comes wenjing in a surprise attack, there goes di feisheng impaled against the mast, and it all goes to hell. di feisheng can't fight honourably because li xiangyi is coming for his life, and for the first time after a pause like this, he's the one who attacks first.

their last skirmish is because now there's nowhere else for either of them to go. all other motivations have been shattered. either one of them must break, or they must fall together. and the latter is exactly what they do.

perhaps, in a thousand other worlds, the duel went differently. but in this one, li xiangyi fought because he thought they both represented everyone, and di feisheng fought because he believed they represented nothing more than themselves, and neither man could understand that the other didn't share their perspective. signalled though it was throughout the fight, and evenly matched though they were, they were fighting two separate battles on that ship. it wasn't anything they could help, only the result of contrasting lives in the jianghu and what it had shaped them both into. and so there was nothing that could come of that duel except for both of them to lose.

[where-the-water-flows]

character asks—hit me up with your hottest jiao liqiao takes

JIAO LIQIAO my best beloved nightmare failgirlboss. she cannot malewife for very long but by god can she manipulate and murder.

favorite thing about them honestly I love that she has a goal and she fucking goes for it, zero hesitation. is it a good, reasonable goal? well no. she would have been better finding someone to fixate on who was not somewhere on the utterly asexual to entirely homosexual spectrum, but y'know, can't win them all. A+ dedication, F- execution.

least favorite thing about them the laugh the laugh I know it is like, the most standard trope signifier thing but the high pitched ahHAHEHEHA laugh is always so jarring in a 'pulls me right out of the narrative' kind of way, I know it is petty but also oh my god please. please you sound like a second rate cartoon villain. please. On a more character less shallow note, bestie babygirl please stop playing with your food. it literally never works out for you, for the love of god. please learn your lesson after the eighth time it bites you in the ass. (also like on the one hand, I would love for her to not have a plot centered around how she is deeply unhinged for/about a man. but on the otherhand, like, idk, I think she's fun. terrible awful etc, but also, she's putting the fun in extremely dysfunctional <3)

favorite line look I love so much every unhinged word out of her mouth, especially the argument she has with snow master when he's like 'girl that man is gay/ace the magic incense amnesia did not make him suddenly not gay/ace he is Manipulating You' and she is like 'lalalala not listening he loves me also we both know that man can't/won't lie to save his life, also also if he is lying I'll mutilate him and keep him like a purse pet <3 but he's not lying. because he loves me.' I recognise that is not a line but like. you know what I mean.

brOTP uhhh I don't really know that she... has... bros. like I guess granny blood (rip), who is basically always full 'yes girl get your man he will def love you this time' in the manner of someone who knows that her friend is lusting after a guy who is 1)not ever going to be interested even if he wasn't 2)very gay/ace and is 3)probably mid at best in bed no matter how much her friend is like SEX GOD. like the most 'yeah girl go get your man!!!! (why that man though have you considered any other man literally there are so many other men) oh no, def the red lipstick, he'll love you in that (but why him for the love of god just buy a vibrator)' that said, I do think the wildly divergent au where li xiangyi ends up 1)aware of nanyin bloodline like. Early On 2) jinyuan alliance aligned, he and his cousin jiao liqiao would be a hilarious pair of nightmares. absolutely ends in disaster for everyone, including them and definitely including di feisheng, I have an entire stupid au vaguely plotted out about this, it is purely nonsense. compels me though.

OTP no<3 that said, like, obviously I do not want the boys to be mmmmm torture mutilated noncon wifed as the otp of my heart, but also, I think jiao liqiao deserves a harem of moderately to severely brainwashed/mutilated/etc malewives! as a treat! god forbid women do anything. I contain multitudes, the dirty joke here is left as an exercise for the reader.

nOTP shan gudao. I just. I think it would be a mess, and not even a fun one. like as an actual relationship I mean, not proxy fighting spy vs spy manipulation But With Sex kinda bullshit, that's fine and fun, but they are not romantically compatible except as a triad where the third part of it is the idea of the man they are individually personally psycho/sexually obsessed with. which I guess makes it like. a weird poly U, with two theoretical ends. weird poly u with them mostly egging each other on in their dysfunction, 100% fine, any sort of Actual Healthy Relationship, no. also, therapy. I think therapy would only make her worse, but on the off chance it did not, I don't want that for her. she's a nightmare! again, god forbid a woman do anything.

random headcanon she was literally never expected to take the throne, nor expected to be the primary way that her particular fork of the nanyin royal line passed down. which means she likely has at least one sister and probably a brother. I don't know if this is backed up or contradicted by canon, but also, she was raised knowing she was nanyin royalty (??) but also was allowed to just fuck off into the jianghu at age [mlc timeline is nonsensical]. like if that is your single heir of the bloodline you have been carefully keeping alive and aware of how they were The True Imperial Family, you are not letting said heir go out and get their ass killed playing with swords. therefore. youngest child jiao liqiao. no further questions, you know in your heart I'm right. less world logistics based, I think she absolutely can't fucking cook, but, crucially, feels that she is fucking aces at it. does she cook? irrelevant, also no obviously not, she is a lady of rank, we have servants for that. but, crucially, she feels in her heart that she is a great cook. not that she cares about it. but again, she is great at it. this is never challenged because 1)di feisheng, the one person I can see her lowering herself to actually cook for, does not pay attention to the taste of food unless he has amnesia, and thus he's certainly not going to be like 'you suck at cooking, ew'. 2) if you are not di feisheng are you going to challenge fucking saintess on her bad cooking? no! she will stab you in the eyeball with a chopstick.

unpopular opinion honestly I don't know that I have that many unpopular opinions on her. other than that she's fun. a nightmare and like, deeply uncomfortable as a character with how incredibly rapey she is, obviously. but fun! she is a problematic queen. terrible woman who really sort of stands out as one of the few of the main cast who uh...doesn't really seem to have any reason behind the terribad decisions she makes other than there is something Wrong With Her, but again, god forbid, etc.

song i associate with them Girlfriend, by Avril Lavigne; the early 2000s angry brat pop is just. so on brand. see also, so much for my happy ending. (also, this has given me the image of idea of early 2000s scene kids jinyuan alliance, which is the funniest fucking thing in the world to me. I don't know what sigu sect would be, but it's just so fucking funny.)

favorite picture of them quick and nasty screencap bc this response has already taken me two days, but like. the whole turn on li lianhua when he's in chains and she's like 'oh you're dangerous to talk to', I just. I feel so abnormal about it. she is so hot and scary.

[ryin-silverfish]

On Erlang's mom, Lotus Lantern, and a neat little discovery

"Erlang's mom is Yaoji, JE's sister."

You can see that statement in literally every JTTW + adjacent fandom, both Chinese and English. Personally, it isn't as annoying as the "Nvwa is JE's daughter" thing, but does get a little tiring when everyone and their mother takes it as actual mythos.

So, in this post, I'll do a bit of digging, and trace the evolutionary trajectory of that claim.

Reading my Lotus Lantern Summaries first will be quite helpful, but if you haven't, I'll be linking to these posts when they become relevant.

The Start of It All

-As far as I know, JTTW novel is the first textual source that said "Erlang is JE's nephew". Specifically, in SWK's pre-battle taunts, he commented that "Hey, I heard JE's sister got chummy with Yang the mortal and gave birth to a son, is that you?" (JTTW Chapter 6)

-The same chapter also mentions that Erlang cleaved open the Peach Mountain to save his mom, implying she was imprisoned as a punishment for her forbidden relationship.

-The other roughly contemporary source, the Precious Scroll of Erlang, expanded on that story: here, Erlang's mom is Lady Yunhua (云花, literally "Cloud-Flower"), part of a trio of three sisters born of "Father Cloud" and "Mother Rain", who embodied the "Three Flowers", a Daoist internal alchemy jargon.

-She is also mentioned to be an immortal maiden of the Dipper-Ox Palace, where Queen Mother of the West resided. Erlang's dad, Yang Tianyou, is the incarnate of a "Golden Boy" acolyte, and they pretty much got insta-married after Yunhua revealed her true identity.

-In the Precious Scroll, Erlang's mom was also put under a mountain by SWK, and he went to QMoW to ask for his mother's whereabouts, pulling off the "carrying the mountains & chasing the suns" stunt on his way to rescue her.

-Pretty different from what you know, right? Here, Erlang was an only child, his mother was never explicitly said to be imprisoned under a mountain by JE's orders, and his father wasn't a run-of-the-mill mortal either.

-So what changed?

Erlang in the Premodern Lotus Lantern stories

-Well, the Lotus Lantern story cycle happened, and Erlang's own mom-saving story got copied over to his nephew Chenxiang.

-However, in all except one iteration of the Lotus Lantern tales, Erlang's parentage was never stated: this iteration is what I called Lotus Lantern 2.0, in which Erlang's own mom-saving story was canon too.

-It did leave out the "SWK put his mom under a mountain" part, though, despite lifting the name Yang Tianyou (and Lady Yunhua too, though her name in this story was Yuntai, "Cloud-Terrace") from the Precious Scroll.

-Similarly, the Lady of Mt. Hua/San Shengmu in all but one iteration of these stories wasn't punished by the Celestial Host, and Erlang putting her under a mountain was entirely his personal decision.

-In the one story that did, it was because she had whipped up a storm and ruined the mortals' crops while she was going after Liu the scholar.

-In fact, in all these pre-modern Lotus Lantern stories, San Shengmu and Liu's relationship was greenlit + Divinely Ordained by the Celestial Host.

The One TV Series to Change it All

-Yep, it's my childhood memory, the 2000s Lotus Lantern + Prequel shows that started the "Erlang's mom was Yaoji" thing!

-Here, she fell in love with the mortal Yang Tianyou after he sacrificed his own heart to save her, Erlang had an older brother named Yang Jiao who was killed together with his father on JE's orders, who also killed Yaoji via exposure to the Ten Suns after her release.

-That last part was probably inspired by the story of Nv Chou in the Books of Mountains and Seas, who was...this random sorceress/witch that got scorched to death by the Ten Suns.

-For a long time, I thought this was it: Erlang's mom being Yaoji was something the show-writers just pulled out of thin air, and entirely their original invention.

-Then I came across this little tidbit in Vol. 3 of the Tang dynasty text, 墉城集仙录...

-Translation: "Lady Yunhua was the 23th daughter of QMoW and the sister of Lady Wang of Taizhen, and her name is Yaoji."

-The last character, 华, is different from the 花 of Yunhua in the Precious Scroll story, but these two characters could often be used interchangeably.

-It must also be noted that the similar name/title is just a coincidence, and mythos-wise, Yaoji's legends never converged with Erlang's mom-saving story at all.

-But yeah, the Lotus Lantern + Prequel show writers probably saw the two names, went "Won't it be neat if we merge them into a single character?", and thus the most influential "urban legend" of Chinese mythos/folklore was born.

(Honestly, with the way myths and folklore evolve, maybe this version of the story would become canonized too after a hundred years or so!)

Edit: Check out the comments——@fate-magical-girls has informed me that the "Erlang's mom being Yaoji" thing had an earlier origin in the 1987 Teochew opera 三姐下凡!

Seems like Lotus Lantern Prequel has taken a lot more inspirations from said opera, aside from that bit: Erlang's three-pronged, double-bladed spear being a three-headed flood dragon he subdued, for example.

[fayeangel25]

MJ RAGHHH-

i forgor to post this here-

Soooo I made another AU (both highschool, preferably art and athletes school, and human AU ) but now with my bestie, KL

She named all of em (except FORDA last names and yknow yknow. So basically traffic light trio in another universe,

DW THEIR PERSONALITIES DON'T CHANGE - ONLY A FEW ON THEIR DESIGNS AND THEIR NAMES!! and ofc the story and other stuff-

Anyways if Ur wondering,

❤️Rem Evander Bull Hong.

🧡Mikael Jasver Qí Heaven.

💚Maxwell Denise Jiao Long.

WE MADE NAMES FOR FUN- DON'T JUDGE ME- /silly

Anywayssss more art coming soon. I need to write more PFFT-

Y'all get MJ first 🧡🧡🧡

(IGNORE THE EFFIN HANDS- I WAS WAITING FOR FOOD WHILE DOING THIS ALL AND GOT TIRED OF WAITING AND GOT LAZY)

Also did this on magma with my twin sis!! (While her magma crashed 😔😊)