#good meng yao

[oh-dameron]

AU where Meng Shi was just a bit more cynical and spent her hard-earned on buying Meng Yao study materials for the Imperial Examination instead of dodgy cultivation manuals. Cultivation is for his father to teach him, after all.

Meng Yao fucking blitzes the exam, because of course he does, and the first time he arrives at Koi Tower it's with an imperial mandate to audit the shit out of them for tax purposes.

[poorlittleyaoyao]

He is not asking next time.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Gaslight, Gatekeep, Girl found dead in a hidden room.

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[thatswhatsushesaid]

time for another meng yao moment i observed while rewatching cql episode 4 for the purposes of snagging some screenshots: it looks like meng yao is giving wei wuxian the stink-eye because he's worried he's going to rat out nie huaisang for bringing his little canary friend into the lecture hall.

so here's the moment when the bird starts chirping (also i find the caption here exquisitely painful for other reasons, but i'll save that for another post)

poor, poor huaisang. buddy u did not think this through. this is the stuff uhoh.jpeg web comics are made of honestly

then right afterwards we have this exquisite shot of so many of the story's key players all together in one moment as teenagers: there's jiang yanli trying her damnedest to pretend none of this is happening (side note: does her actor also have a background in dance? her ballet-style first position here is really good); jiang cheng looking like he's ready to pitch a shit fit; nie huaisang is EXCEPTIONALLY BAD at hiding how guilty he is; wei wuxian is just the 👀 emoji if someone granted it human form; and then there's meng yao, who is just--

"wei-gongzi you hear nothing. wei-gongzi don't u fuckin say a fuckin word. snitches get stitches wei-gongzi."

[lgbtlunaverse]

While I think the moment in cql where Meng Yao– still bleeding from a stab wound in his chest btw– realizes Lan Xichen is in danger and decides to save the man who was so kind to him in cloud recesses is cute and all, nothing will ever beat the book for me. Little bookkeeper civilian Meng Yao, who has not had a serious chance to make his dreams of being a cultivator come true in fucking years, out of nowhere gets the fucking sect leader of Gusu Lan dropped right in his lap?

It's such a great example of Meng Yao's multilayered motivations to me. Because is civilian Meng Yao thinking of all the ways he can use this? Of the fact that having a great sect leader in his debt is the best thing that could happen to him? Duh. Obviously.

Is he very purposeful about appearing to Lan Xichen as a kind young man full of untapped potential, brave and willing to put his life on the line even though he really doesn't know so much about about cultivators, no sir, except a little he picked up here and there, because you see his father– 👉👈 Of course he is!

But the way through which he does that is... by actually saving Lan Xichen's life, at no doubt significant personal risk. The way he makes Lan Xichen believe he's kind and selfless is by... being kind and selfless. Just because he's doing it on purpose doesn't mean he's not doing it.

Is it lying if you want people to think you're nice and so you're nice to them? Isn't that just called being nice? Yes, he is very purposeful about how he appears to people, and very carefully crafts an image based on what he wants them to think of him, but most of the time he does that simply by... actually being the kind of person he wants to appear as. He still did the kind things he did, regardless of his motivations for doing them.

[restingdomface]

Sect Leader Yao: *loudly ranting about WWX being evil and how he shouldn’t have ‘been invited’ as if the man hadn’t been forcefully summoned like a demon of some sort*

Nie Mingjue: …Sect Leader Yao?

SLYao: -what?

Nie Mingjue: *pointing down* Your robes are on fire.

SLYao: *runs out of the hall screaming when he can’t get it put out*

Other leaders: *trying to figure out if WWX was the one that set him on fire*

Wei Wuxian: *sitting behind a shielding array, both stuck and not wanting to tempt someone to attack him, actively hiding a confused A-Yaun behind his skirts* :)

A-Yaun: ??:)??

Jiang Yanli: *eagerly showing him Jin Ling and probably thinks WWX and JC managed this so WWX could be at his 100 day celebration, isn’t gonna ask where they can get in trouble*

Jiang Cheng: *thinking exactly the same thing but about Yanli and WWX, showing off his nice new hair pin Yanli got him*

Jin Zixuan: *just happy this is less horrible than he expected*

Lan Wangji: *giving WWX blinks of affection and love*

Wei Wuxian: :)

Nie Mingjue: …but who set Sect Leader Yao on fire?

Lan Xichen: I don’t know, but it’s so much more peaceful now :)

Meng Yao: *appears at NMJ’s elbow, holding hands with NHS and looking pleased* I found that array in Jin Guangshan’s office :) it’ll wear off in about five hours. They’ll be so excited when they realize they can pass him random objects through the shield :)

Nie Huaisang: I set Sect Leader Yao’s robes on fire :)

Nie Mingjue: Ohhh you two are just so cute, I am giving you both presents when we get home.

NHS & MY: :D

[carbonbestgirl]

been getting really into jin guangyao lately i think i’m a xiyao truther now 🙂‍↕️😭 the doomed lovers trope is tooooo goooddd

[lilapplesheadcannons]

Meng Yao(fuming): Absolutely not! I forbid you to step a foot out of the Unclean Realms!

Nie HuaiSang: Buuuuuut San-geeeeee....

Meng Yao: Not a single toe! Not to mention the pressure of getting a new Heir in case you end up dying, what will your Da-Ge say if he returns from the Cloud Recess early and finds you gone?

Nie HuaiSang: He won't find out. I'll be back before that. I promise. Come on, Wei Wuxian wrote there's a fair going on in Yiling. It will be so much fun!

Meng Yao: No! And you will not sneak out in the middle of the night.

Nie HuaiSang, all pretences gone: Or what? Will you tell Da-Ge about what I did?

Meng Yao: No, I'll tell you what I do to your Da-Ge! No amount of cleansing will clear that memory!

[dailyayao]

[ionshi-teiru]

rain season

[symphonyofsilence]

I was reading a "Meng Yao joins the Yunmeng Jiang Sect" AU when it occurred to me that WWX, JC, & MY would have been so much like Mo Ran, Xue Meng, & Shi Mei. (Also Shijie would have had someone in possession of a brain cell to talk to)

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

He was just being a silly little guy!

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[thatswhatsushesaid]

quick, we need to inject some unapologetic positivity into the jgy side of the mdzs fandom. i'll go first:

1) no one in this book is as devoted to their mother as jin guangyao is to meng shi, and i love that about him.

2) can you imagine being newly orphaned and rejected by your only known living relative, penniless and without prospects, only to meet the injured heir to a ravaged sect and choosing to spend what slim resources you have protecting him and keeping him safe? because that's what meng yao did for lan xichen, and i think that's insane (affectionate)

3) what a cultivation prodigy jin guangyao actually was! no formal training, no support from a sect, no guidance from a dedicated teacher or mentor, and he still possesses such a natural gift for the qin that his talent with this instrument is recognized and admired widely across the jianghu. the only cultivators with more raw talent for it than him are members of the gusu lan. iconic.

4) those watchtowers saved hundreds of thousands of commoners' lives, which is, again, something precious few members of the gentry had any interest in investing their time or resources into doing.

5) the reason that post-canon wangxian can fuck nasty on every single exposed surface of the cloud recesses is because jin guangyao spent his slim political capital after the war pressuring jgs into sparing the funds to help rebuild it. say thank you, xiandu.

for once, sect leader yao is right and he should say it.

[lgbtlunaverse]

Jgy is a class traitor this, jgy is the only person who cares about the common people that. Jgy is the type of guy who would scab during a strike, bring in a union-buster to earn favours from upper management, slowly work his way up to CEO and then give everyone the extra vacation days and payraises they were asking for anyway. Which is an extremely funny type of guy to be. Like, can we all take a break from arguing to agree how fucking hilarious that is?

[seventhchance]

There's nothing wrong with JGY that being dead for 13-16 years wouldn't fix.

[xluna-reclipse]

A lot of "villains" think they're good guys and do bad things. JGY thinks he's a bad guy and does good things. Which is sad because if he'd committed, he could've lived.