#fengqing being clowns

[cecropiacrown]

"What!?" Shi Qingxuan gasps, leaning forward from their place sprawled on He Xuan's lap. One hand flits to their chest while their other reaches forward to wave dramatically in Xie Lian's direction, an ornery little grin on their face.

"A-Lian," they chide, unserious. "You lost it?"

Xie Lian wrinkles his nose at that, smiling a bit awkwardly.

Mu Qing and Feng Xin have been sitting off to the side, arguing about their current game of cards, but Feng Xin perks up at the change in conversation, looking like he may be getting ready to interject. Mu Qing, with his thin face a little red from secondhand embarrassment, has been pretending to not be listening. After all, the two of them are quite well-aware of what Xie Lian is talking about, considering they share an apartment with him.

Mu Qing thumps Feng Xin on the chest with the back of his hand before he has a chance to go and say something stupid. Feng Xin just shoots him a confused and angry look and licks his lips like he's getting ready to speak anyway. With a sigh and a heavy eyeroll, Mu Qing knocks his knee against Feng Xin's for emphasis. The action pulls a groan from Feng Xin and a muttered 'bitch', but successfully discourages him from doing whatever it was he was going to do.

The two of them make a big show of stacking their cards together and splitting them in half so they each have a section to shuffle.

Xie Lian watches his friends being unsubtle and completely ridiculous and sighs after a moment, shaking his head.

“Ah, I've never liked that saying. I didn't lose it, I actually gave it away quite willingly, haha…”

Hua Cheng takes this moment to slink back from the kitchen with a can of sparkling water in one hand and a bottle of beer in the other. He hands the sparkling water to Xie Lian, who takes it with a quiet ‘thank you, San Lang’ and a small smile.

“Did I miss something?" Hua Cheng asks in a low voice directed solely to Xie Lian. He pointedly ignores everyone else as he plops down onto the couch and—whether to show off or just because he is the way he is—Hua Cheng uses his teeth to crack the cap off his beer bottle. He flicks the cap onto the coffee table and settles in comfortably beside Xie Lian, leaning against the back of the couch as he takes a leisurely sip.

Xie Lian bites his lip, his arm slung over the back of the couch behind Hua Cheng as he makes to lean into his space to whisper to him. Shi Qingxuan, however, beats him to it.

“Hua Cheng!" they gush, grinning from ear to ear. Hua Cheng closes his eye like the sound of their voice is grating to him and sighs before looking in Shi Qingxuan's direction, a cold and mirthless smile on his lips.

"What?" he deadpans, clearly uninterested as he takes another sip of his drink.

"Did you know our dear Lianlian isn't a virgin anymore?”

Hua Cheng sputters, choking on his drink, and breaks into a small coughing fit.

Xie Lian winces and quickly works to soothe Hua Cheng, alternating between patting him on the back and rubbing little circles between his shoulder blades. Hua Cheng's normally pale features have gone red from the exertion. Mu Qing snorts at the scene but otherwise stifles his laugh—unlike Feng Xin whose own laugh startles out into the room, earning him a sharp look of disapproval from Xie Lian.

Poor Shi Qingxuan is at a loss, pouting as they slump back against He Xuan's chest and cross their arms.

“Well, uh," Xie Lian starts, smiling sheepishly as he shifts his hand down from Hua Cheng's back to hold him gently at his waist.

"You could say that San Lang was actually the first to know..?”

"Gege!"

[missveryvery]

(Update...Why did this upload at such a tiny resolution... ok I separated them out to see if that would help?!?)

FengQing + Some unhinged rarepairs

FengQing - fx is comforting him after he got very beat up + almost died

FengFeng (Feng Xin x Shi Qingxuan) - tiny kiss

Hua Cheng x Shi Qingxuan (so deranged there's not even a name for it) - Shi Qingxuan trying to comfort/reassure Hua Cheng and Hua Cheng kissing the top of his head and feeling protective

HuaQing (Hua Cheng x Mu Qing) - Hua Cheng is being mean to try and distract him but Mu Qing is like very weak or sick or something and going to get too upset :)

FengQing - sleepy clown boys, honk shoo mimimimimi

QingQing (Mu Qing x Shi Qingxuan) - Mu Qing being very relaxed and sincerely happy because he has a sweet, snuggly bunny that gushes over him

[jayktoralldaylong]

Me with FengQing. XD

Do I love them with everything within me? Yes. Do I think they make any lick of sense and would work in an ACTUAL relationship? Not in any life time. 💀😂😭 One day into the relationship they would have a stupid fight over something completely irrelevant like where to place cups after using them and bring their whole house down.

We're talking about the same two clowns that were basically holding WWE entertainment wrestling matches for the whole heavenly court. Every time they started fighting people would gather round, not because they wanted to help separate them or anything like that, but they were legit bringing their popcorn to watch because they found the whole thing entertaining. These Supreme martial gods were legit being treated like clowns. 😭😂 Not even before they ascended were they able to have s single civil conversation without misunderstanding each other. At best this ship gets a few moments of adorable fluff before they start tearing into each other again.

I adore cat X dog relationships but I know very well that this is one cat and dog that would give each other the wrong kind of scars on their wedding night.

as the most hardcore hardcorest shin soukoku shipper, what the fuck do you mean 'domestic shin soukoku'?

what do you mean they've been together for 10 years they would break up after like a week

[missveryvery]

FengQing dynamics, book vs fan interpretation, General Thoughts about Clown Generals:

Mostly me trying to stare at canon and figure out what these dumbasses think about each other and what their actual relationship is, what's actually written instead of my hopes and dreams for clown love.

we all keep writing/drawing Mu Qing being the mean one and Feng Xin as the nice one but....Feng Xin is the one that relentlessly says horrible things to him, usually unprovoked.

Feng Xin's insults:

That he hates him, that he never wants to see him again, that he's lying, that whenever he sees him doing something it absolutely must be for personal/nefarious reasons, that he's happy when xl does crimes, he's untrustworthy, that he's always scheming, that he thinks he's better than he is, that he wouldn't be where he is without Xie Lian.

Mu Qing's insults are:

that Feng Xin is just as "disloyal" as him for leaving. Basically, his usual argument is "you are just as bad as me." This is his big thing, arguably his only thing.

He maybe thinks the bathhouse is Feng Xin's fault, like he took them somewhere perverted on purpose

His statues? whack.

Says Feng Xin made a big deal about nothing about Xie Lian stealing.

I'm wracking my brain here because a lot of them aren't personal insults so much as making fun of him for something rather than saying he's a bad person. Like he tells Xie Lian about the Ju Yang thing. That's not something Feng Xin did wrong, it's something embarrassing that happened to Feng Xin.

Here's one:

Actually, rereading this, I wonder if he meant Xie Lian...? Since that's the person who they felt like couldn't tell who was a ghost. And Feng Xin has always been able to discern ghostness so far so that seems weirdly specific. Which is nuts because I think we all feel like Mu Qing should insult his intelligence all the time (Feng Xin isn't as dumb as I wish he was, though so...)

I'm extremely guilty of all of this, to be clear. And I don't know why. Sometimes I carefully have Feng Xin realize he was awful and be apologetic, sometimes deal with it.

But probably most of the time, offhandedly, I'm like "Ah yes mq wouldn't catch him in a trust fall", which is something I just saw on my dash. when it's demonstrably, literally untrue, right?

They would both catch each other without hesitation. They literally do! Even when it's at a great risk to themselves!

I think the difference is what they think will happen:

Mu Qing, idk I could go either way. He might know that Feng Xin will catch him because Feng Xin is Like That. Or he might think it's a big question mark.

By Tong'lu he says something to the effect that he's running from them because they'll just kill him if they get ahold of him. But by then things have been escalating. Feng Xin hit him during the avalanche thing off screen and Mu Qing was surprised by it and asked why he'd hit him. We saw Feng Xin punch him before (after ghost city arc), but Mu Qing wasn't confused as to why that time. In other words, normally he might completely trust him but the events of the book threw everything out the window.

But I can't say for sure what Mu Qing would think would happen.

Weirdly, Feng Xin's response is the more complicated one.

Feng Xin does NOT think Mu Qing will or has serious doubts. Except...that's just what he'll verbalize. Literally what happens in the book, he gives no visible indication that he even remotely believes Mu Qing's explanations at Tong'lu.

It's only after Mu Qing suddenly disappears that the narrator tells us that he wasn't as convinced of Mu Qing 's guilt as he acted. He was just pissed and being an asshole. Mu Qing's disappearance is what actually shakes Feng Xin's belief in Mu Qing.

They have another argument earlier about JL:

-Feng Xin assumes the worst

-Mu Qing explains

-Feng Xin backs down for the moment (and goes to have a nervous breakdown)

-but when he sees him again he starts attacking him (avalanche scene), and this fight is bad enough that they've actually pulled weapons on each other

-This fight/argument continues until Hua Cheng shows up and they have bigger things to worry about

Then we have this:

Feng Xin's pattern might be:

Get mad, assume the worst, say things he doesn't mean, eventually calms down about it/acts like it's fine.

There are a couple times where he's argued into shutting up. It's just that he will bring that thing out, that he has been acting like he calmed down about and accepted, when he's mad.

I think he actually does at least subconsciously believe an Mu Qing Explanation PowerPoint. Why? Because that's what his overall behavior reflects. Or, even if, let's say he doesn't believe anything Mu Qing says ever, thinks he's the fucking worst: he still goes on little adventures with him and hangs out with him.

He doesn't suffer people he dislikes very much, does he? He doesn't even want Xie Lian to hang out with Hua Cheng! He's very "don't associate with those kinds of people." Actually, basically everything you "know" about Feng Xin, is not quite accurate by the end of the book, just like it is with Mu Qing.

Anyway, he still happily puts Xie Lian in a dress with Mu Qing. That's basically the definition of a sworn brother.

But at the end of the day, even though I think this is all very shitty behavior on Feng Xin's part and jail for Feng Xin, jail for Feng Xin for One Thousand Years, their relationship is something Mu Qing likes. He cares what he thinks about him. He doesn't want Feng Xin to think badly of him. Despite Feng Xin being the least generous person with benefit of the doubt, he still defends himself with him and the only other person he does that with is Xie Lian. Everyone else he's accepted he can't do anything about.

Like they must be having good times together that they both find worthwhile or they wouldn't be together. He must find things about him that he values.

Best guess is: he admires Feng Xin's selflessness and devotion to "what's right", the same way he thinks Xie Lian is cool. He wants to be around these two people. These are also the aspects he fucking hates the most and says are stupid and pointless and will get you killed. He hates this behavior, he rants about it, he is horrified by it, and yet he is someone who does it over and over and over again. And it always comes back to bite him in the ass.

As for what Feng Xin likes about Mu Qing...I don't know. Like I can't even guess. He likes the Queen a lot who is gentle and kind hearted and he likes the bravery and toughness of JL. He idolizes Xie Lian. But at no point does he assert Mu Qing is anything but the opposite of those people. Even when he has evidence to the contrary he forgets it or dismisses it. So I really have no idea what a canon reason is for him to like Mu Qing.

Maybe he thinks "I'll go with him because it seems fun or interesting" and "I have to protect him" and doesn't consciously attribute any part of that to Mu Qing.

It's possible he doesn't actually like him, as much as I hate to admit it, this would be mind-numbingly realistic for a guy that doesn't like thinking deeply about things. I think a lot of people don't think too deeply about friendship, because most of the time it's about familiarity and proximity and availability. We both like this activity, you're the person I know, we do it together. I'm sure you've met people, even married couples, that when it comes down to it don't actually like each other, they're just together out of familiarity and habit.

I do wonder what it would have been like if Mu Qing had died, that's kind of the usual outcome for a character like this, I feel like I rarely see in an adult book where a character like this has a suicide mission and then is ok or not, idk, very fucked up by it at least.

I do think they're friends, canonically, but I think their relationship is very unlike what we're used to seeing. But I also think mirrors closely a lot of relationships you see in real life, especially with dudes who hang out but don't figure out a Very Important Subject Ever.

Mostly this was just me making notes to myself and then I thought I'd share.