#get it? wuyan? judi? no presence + kungfu jedi mind tricks? aahahahaha. eeeeh.

[kingsandbastardz]

here u go, ask for trying times: give me your pitch for shipping wudi, i've got maybe one foot on that ship but i'm curious on your thoughts (gl on the all-nighter!!)

I survived it, sorta. The deadlines keep trucking om 😭 So here's my thoughts:

It's really unfortunate that we don't see enough of Wuyan but I do think we have enough of a framework to draw some interesting conclusions about them both relationship-wise. So here's to me heavily analyzing the 5 minutes Wuyan is on screen! LMAO:

Service as show of devotion - Chooses to act like and appear as a lower rank personal servant to dfs even though he clearly has a lot of power to draw from to get things done and dfs tells him he sees his rank as being much higher

Of everyone that focuses their attention on dfs, he's the only one that doesn't want to own or control him (master di - slave, jlq - wife, llh - 主人, fdb - wants to be in charge)

Despite knowing he was massively outclassed, still put himself in lxy's path at donghai

Shared experience: both survived the Donghai battle together and both have matching chest scars courtesy of lxy. They also worked side by side for years to accomplish the same goals

Llh is presented as knowing dfs the best - but imo, that means wuyan knows even more. Wuyan knows all the why's that llh doesn't know

We don't see much general conversation but considering how relaxed dfs is around him and willing to winge about personal things - he seems like he's actually capable of communicating well with dfs lmao

Pure headcanon here, but I want to say he and dfs learned or figured out how to hide their chi at a high level together. DFS uses it all the time and seems to be undetectable even to llh - wuyan seems to be undetectable to the world - I mean i think his name means something like "without presence"? He comes pre-labelled. So I think it's something martial-skill related that would give additional meat to dfs' respect for him

Guards dfs' secrets - how dfs truly feels about all the mengzhu stuff and rankings etc. Don't know if he knows anything about Di Fortress, but anything he does know about dfs' background it's not going to be a topic of conversation

He pays attention to dfs' preferences and knows how to deliver them in the form he prefers (see jlq who doesn't know his preferences and hates that dfs doesn't like what she prepared for him)

As a personal guard, in the early days when dfs was weaker, he likely went with dfs to any secret meetings with llh, hid his chi to keep guard, and was privy to what went on between them. Likely is the only one that would know this information - which is also why he fully understands why dfs is obsessed with llh and supports him. And listened to him mourn him for however many years (I assume he's the one providing clean clothes and food during seclusion so that's 10 years of crying he's been privy to)

Is willing to extend his top level standard of service to the ppl dfs cares about

He acts like he's a nobody, and he's not a pretty face, but everything points to him actually being a very, very competent and high-level guy in his area of expertise? So a good match to dfs. His martial skill isn't comparable, so he can't fight him like lxy, but he can do all the things dfs doesn't like to do - like the organizational stuff, dealing with and managing ppl, etc.

Headcanon again: i can really see them having an experimental phase in their youth together. Like something where dfs and him kinda decide to test things out and then maybe deciding the timing was bad or they weren't into each other like that at that time or whatever. But deciding to remain friends instead. And continuing to build jinyuan alliance together and everything else. It's like best bro + work spouse rolled into one -- with the wild result that they come out even stronger at the end of it. Think lxy + zhan yunfei but they see each other and work together every day. Successfully. With some extra headcanon and a small stretch you can probably position him and dfs as foils to lxy and shan gudao? (Sadly not enough info about the formation of daily workings of JA back then)

headcanon continued: They have to have good communication because they negotiated or figured out how to navigate their Situation and have clearly been at it for awhile - with one being a 'servant' and with the other one having ptsd issues with servitude/slavery. In the waterfall scene we get to see dfs mildly checking in and essentially being all, "Uh, you still good there? Remember you can change things up any time you want. My opinion of you is still A++ fyi" and Wuyan essentially signalling he's fine by continuing on as always.

Wuyan is the last person alive that remembers who dfs was before Jinyuan Alliance and the development of the Di Mengzhu persona. He helped craft that persona.

Basically if you are into themes like fealty and devotion and the sort of comfort you can get from a long time friendship where they've seen each other at their worst. Where they've figured out how to communicate and operate/exist together seamlessly while making allowances for each others' needs and interests. This is it!

They could be queer platonic, they could be sexual, they can be any permutations of anything and it still doesn't change the basis of their relationship which is years of trust, communication, hard work and shared experiences.

Like imagine teenagers - one holding the other guy's hair up while he vomits blood and bile into an alley. Where they patch each others' wounds in the shadow of someone's doorway after getting their asses kicked but somehow also saving each other from getting killed that day. They're the ones that figure out how to kill together. How to hide together. They figure out how to teach others to kill and hide together. They build power with their joined hands and with it they gain the money and prestige that allows them a comfortable place to sleep and full bellies. They give this same thing to others. They build it up so well people can afford to do normal ppl shit like fall in love and get married.

These are things they likely wouldn't have thought of when they were engaged in a battle royale in the street. It's them, their circle of friends, against everyone else in the world. And even when all their friends are now dead - they're still alive. They're still together. They'll see it through.

Maybe one day they'll find their way into each other's beds - the future is ever changing. But whether they do or not doesn't matter - they already have each other. They've survived this much together. Anything else is just icing.