#he’s longed for binghe since the moment he first read about him <3< /div> Explore tagged Tumblr posts

[spottedgardeneelstan]

nobody likes being alone!

continuation of this

[tk-duveraun]

11/? Luo Binghe is SO NORMAL about Shen Yuan

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 (here), 12

Read up through even numbered parts on Ao3

Luo Binghe dedicated all of his time to repairing his relationship with Shen Yuan. He cooked every meal, but kept the presentation plain rather than extravagant and showy. Some foods were completely banned. Anything that was considered a couple's food was off the table.

Ning Yingying helped fill in the gaps in his knowledge left by IRS's shitty writing. She also brought their masters peaches when Shen Yuan desperately wanted some and Luo Binghe couldn't bring himself to provide them.

Shen Jiu being fed his cooking also helped keep the behavior from seeming suggestive. Similarly, Luo Binghe did some of the laundry from both Peak Lords. He took care of outer robes and accessories, since he had knowledge of stain removal from silks and expensive cloth from his time in Blackswan. Meanwhile, Ming Fan washed or delegated their undergarments.

The pang in his heart at missing the opportunity to sniff Shen Yuan's inner robes was easily outweighed by his beloved's piece of mind.

Managing Qing Jing Peak's affairs brought to light another strange thing: Shen Yuan never left the mountain without another Peak Lord in his company. In IRS this had been explained by needing support or sudden dual cultivation for Without a Cure, but not only was Shen Yuan not suffering from the poison, but based on the records, this informal restriction existed for his entire tenure as Peak Lord.

Luo Binghe didn't like Ming Fan, but the Original Goods' cordial relationship with his shixiong was a boon.

"Really?" Ming Fan replied when asked about Shen Qingchun not leaving the peak alone. He leaned over Luo Binghe's papers and frowned. "I never noticed. He wasn't injured and his cultivation has always been stable."

Unlike Shen Qingqiu's went unsaid, but not forgotten given the deepening of Ming Fan's frown.

"Shizun," Ming Fan began, meaning Shen Jiu, "goes off peak frequently without an escort. He's always been the mind to Shifu's sword; it seems strange, though perhaps not." Ming Fan sighed and covered his eyes. "Shifu does seem to find himself in… unusual circumstances. It's probably nothing."

"Thanking Shixiong for his insight."

"Thank you for getting that stain out. I thought Shizun was going to kill me when I spilled his ink."

"I'll be leaving first." Luo Binghe finished the plesantries and returned Shen Yuan's records to Qing Jing's archives so no one else could look at them. Next he planned to look into the records from when Shen Yuan was a disciple, but those were stored on An Ding Peak. He would either need an excuse to access the files or an opportunity to break in.

The amount of important things Snowballing left out or just deliberately lied about was getting frustrating. Once again, Luo Binghe felt the deep desire to strangle him. Maybe when he was Shen Yuan's, his husband would teach him how to summon a soul from another world.

But that was a long term plan, for the moment he had to scout out An Ding. He had plenty of opportunities to scope it out, since Shen Yuan was constantly sending long letters to Shang Qinghua. Long enough that Luo Binghe had to give some credit to the fans that thought Shang Qinghua would be the endgame match for Shen Yuan.

Of course, even if Snowballing originally wanted that, Luo Binghe was here now for his wife.

Luo Binghe was full of grace and not anger. Luo Binghe liked Ning Yingying because she gave Shen Yuan peaches and all of the delightful treats he didn't allow himself to give his master. If he kept repeating those things to himself, he wouldn't do anything rash.

Luo Binghe took a deep breath and used the support beam above him to drag his body another few inches under the Bamboo House. Ning Yingying had brought a cat on peak. Not a terrible a idea, given that Shen Yuan loved all critters and they loved him in return. However, this cat was a queen on the edge of birth. So she had immediately found a loose board and weaseled her way underneath Shen Yuan's beloved home and had her kittens.

So now he was crawled on his back under the Bamboo House trying to remove the kittens. At least they were only three days old and wouldn't try to run away and squirm. He just wished he had the space to roll over. Moving would be easier on his stomach, but he didn't think he could bring his delicate cargo out that way.

His hair was a rats nest full of dirt and rocks. The robes were a complete loss. He should have changed out of his special, personal disciple robes for it, but he didn't think that far ahead and thus all of his beautiful embroidery would have to be done again. He liked Ning-shijie and might even, one day, forgive her for this disaster.

Worst of all, he couldn't hear a word from above, so either it wasn't as if he could use this opportunity to eavesdrop.

With his precious burden — three kittens — stuffed down the front of his robes, he began the long, indecorous wiggle back out. With the hard part complete, he let his mind wander, vaguely examining the fine construction that went into his wife's home.

Until he might as well as been slapped in the face. Before Meng Mo could realize something more interesting that kittens was happening, he threw up his mental shields.

There, through the raw Barbed Field Sheep's wool that served as insulation, was a complex array carved into the bottom of Shen Yuan's floorboards. There was blood in the grooves, enforcing and powering the spell. Luo Binghe felt his sweat freeze and his chest still for a moment before he was scrambling fiercely out of the crawlspace.

He didn't even care as his robes tore and he felt rocks dig into his flesh. Shen Yuan was in danger! What was this plotline? Did Snowball include anything important in that stupid book?

[violetdisasterzone]

Luo Binghe & Selflessness

There's a great post by @/jayktoralldaylong talking about how all the love interests in MXTX's novels prioritize the safety and well-being of the MCs rather than prioritizing - or even expecting - their love being returned. And image my surprise when the first reply I see is "Except Binghe. That bitch will sleep with your corpse," with others agreeing and calling him the "worst MXTX character" in the tags. I am yet again asking, did we read the same book? Luo Binghe is just as single-mindedly devoted to Shen Qingqiu as any of the others. Evidence of this is found at every turn during the main plot of Scum Villain: the plot during which he was actively possessed by a sentient evil sword. A sword which in a different timeline - a timeline without Shen Yuan - almost single-handedly turned Luo Bingge into a tyrant. He is under this influence for a majority of volumes 2 and 3 (of the Eng. transl.), which is also when he is accused of being "crazy" or "pushy" in regards to Shen Qingqiu.

Since the reply that inspired this post discussed the 5 years in which Shen Qingqiu was dead, that's what I'll address first. When Shen Qingqiu self-destructs, Luo Binghe is caught extremely off guard. It's easy, I think, to forget or disregard just how awful and confusing the entire novel's events have been for Binghe so far. Accepted to Qing Jing and subsequently horrifically abused for 4 years; a sudden, drastic, unexplained change in Shen Qingqiu and a blissful 3 years of peace; pushed into hell and utterly betrayed in an act of what appears to be very out of character hypocrisy. And when he returns (now in possession of the aforementioned sentient evil sword), he stays away from Cang Qiong and becomes a respectable cultivator in his own right, so that maybe, maybe Shen Qingqiu would accept him once again. And then he runs into Shen Qingqiu enjoying the company of someone who looks exactly like him; yet Shen Qingqiu runs from him, acting as though Binghe is the one who is dangerous, who is going to hurt him. Of course, Shen Qingqiu is justified in his fear, based on his own perceptions of the situation. But Luo Binghe does not know this.

Immediately following Shen Qingqiu's destruction is one of the only times we get a firsthand glimpse into Luo Binghe's perspective. This line is from the moments after he catches Shen Qingqiu's body: "Didn't Shizun hate his blood more than anything? Wasn't he unwilling to even be near him, to associate with him at all?" In the following pages is when he learns, for the first time that "Shizun too was...utterly heartbroken" during his time in the Abyss. When the chapter ends, Luo Binghe is still in utter shock, wiping the blood from Shen Qingqiu's face and trying, uselessly, to explain that he was just angry, that he just wanted to make him happy. We don't see the part of the scene where Luo Binghe leaves with the body, but it is not hard to infer that, in his complete state of denial and shock, his mind recently saved from an agonizing deviation, he was unwilling to part from his Shizun.

During the five years of Shen Qingqiu's absence, Luo Binghe kept his body in as perfect a state as possible. As we see in the Deep Dream extra, Luo Binghe brings Mu Qingfang (who he seems to respect, however minimally) to Huan Hua Pavilion some time after the events of Hua Yue City (which we know because Mu Qingfang expects Shen Qingqiu's body to "have long since festered and decayed"). We, as Shen Qingqiu, then get a glimpse into what Luo Binghe does with the body: he cooks countless meals that will go uneaten, and he transfers qi to prevent that decay. Skin to skin contact is the most direct way to transfer qi, as supported in many other scenes, including the flashback scene in this same extra. This type of qi transfer can also be carried out while sleeping, as evidenced in the Bing-mei vs. Bing-ge extra, providing a regulated stream of spiritual energy for an entire night. As Mu Qingfang said earlier, this uses up "an enormous amount of spiritual power" and is only enough to keep his body protected "for a single day" without reversing everything. Luo Binghe is immensely powerful, but even protagonists are not built to drain themselves every night for 5 years, while also fighting off Xin Mo, running Huan Hua, controlling the demon realm, and NOT giving up on everything. When Shen Qingqiu is thought to be dead in the minutes after Maigu Ridge, Luo Binge "almost tried to follow" him. And yet, when he believed there was even a chance he might return, he held on "for almost two thousand more of these days and nights."

The only other time we see Luo Binghe's interactions with the corpse is when Shen Qingqiu, undiscovered in the plant body, witnesses Liu Qingge's infiltration. In this, it is said that "Luo Binghe was unwilling to harm the corpse, so he could only release it." It's worth mentioning that, if Liu Qingge had managed to take the body back to Cang Qiong - or, what sequence is initiated when he does - it will be given burial rights, it will decay, and Shen Qingqiu will never again have a possibility of inhabiting it. Luo Binghe cannot let this happen; it's not merely about possession or attachment. And yet, he would sooner allow this possibility that allowing even the potential of harm to come to him.

When all is said and done, after Luo Binghe has been broken out of Xin Mo's control and Shen Qingqiu does not die - the first thing he does is return him to Cang Qiong Mountain. When Shen Qingqiu suggests that they leave, together, Luo Binghe is "dumbfounded." He fully expected to be left, for Shen Qingqiu to be unwilling. He would have done anything for Shen Qingqiu and expected nothing in return.

At his core, even under influence and in emotional turmoil, Luo Binghe's love is unfalteringly selfless. There are so many examples of this, both in the main plot and in the post-canon extras, but I think this post is long enough already. Suffice it to say that nothing is more important that Shen Qingqiu to Luo Binghe - least of all himself.

[unforth]

Hello unforth! Thank you for your wonderful blog, and the the untamed art blog!! I followed you years ago for destiel, and you were one of the people that got me into the untamed. I watched it last summer and have been binging various cdramas ever since!! I had a question for you about reading. After watching the untamed I read the novel, and didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would. I think you’re someone who prefers the show, but if not, sorry if I’m remembering wrong… hoping you understand. I want to try reading other novels but I found the romance in mdzs to be kinda off. I guess I’m wondering if you have a recommendation for the best novel you’ve read so far? It would be great if it’s one with fanfic but if not I’m still curious to try! I hope this didn’t come off as rude about the untamed, it’s just a personal preference. Thanks in advance, and thanks again for all your work in fandom!

Howdy! *waves*

You have not misremembered, I definitely prefer the Untamed to the novel of MDZS (and I'm with you, no shade on people with different preferences, of course!). I also didn't enjoy the novel of MDZS as much as I thought I would, though I think some of that was because I read the Exiled Rebels Scanalations translation which - again, no shade, translating that was a HUGE job and kudos to them - but I do here from native speakers that some questionable translation choices were made, which can detract from some people's enjoyment of the novel (and can enhance other people's, it just depends how those translation choices relate to each person's personal likes and dislikes).

Now, I can tell you what I've read and what I've thought of each one, happily - I don't know what turned you off about MDZS specifically, beyond an aspect of the relationship dynamic, so it'll be hard for me to say which of these might appeal to you more? But, here's a list of which danmei novels I've read, and my opinion. The list is shorter than you'd think - danmei novels are long and I read slow, lol.

Note that all of these end happy, for various definitions of "happy," and the main ship is canon in all of them. Also note that I tried to avoid spoilers, but sometimes it's hard to even talk about the ship dynamic without some mild spoilers.

These are (roughly) in the order I've read them; I just finished the last a few days ago. All art is by the official artists, but I'm not always sure what their names are, sorry - I've tried to figure them out for my art blogs but it's REALLY hard.

1. Mo Dao Zu Shi, by MXTX.

(since I'm writing this post for you, and you're already familiar with it, I'm not putting in TW and plot)

My take: I figure knowing my opinion of MDZS will help you assess all this? There are things I loved about MDZS, including the book, but MDZS is still obviously trying to figure out pacing. Whereas in SVSSS, the storyline doesn't always flow that smoothly and the ending is rushed, in MDZS in my opinion the biggest issue is that she clearly didn't plan some things ahead. For example, Miangmian and Wen Ning are both introduced within a few pages of when they'll be needed to Do Shit. It shows that she hadn't quite worked everything out as she was going, and every once in a while was like, "shit shit I need a character for this thing" and hastily added them. The plot itself is better paced, though, though I could have wished for a less talky denouement. When it was the only one I read, I also often thought, "this author doesn't understand consent," and, "this author has kinks I don't share." Now that I've read all three of her books, I completely retract the first one. MXTX absolutely understands consent, and was intentionally playing with it in MDZS. Not sure if the evidence of that got lost in translation, or what, but...yeah.

Relationship Dynamic: ...the second of those opinions, I still kinda feel. The consensual non-con is just not really my thing, like I'm okay with it in small doses? And I don't love some aspects of Lan Wangji's domineering attitudes and Wei Wuxian's act of bare tolerating it. And don't get me wrong, now that I'm more familiar with her work, I think it was an intentional writing choice and I also think they're both largely roleplaying it a lot of the time...but I still don't personally enjoy it much.

2. Scum Villain Self-Saving System, by MXTX.

Genre: modern transmigration into a fantasy xianxia world.

Where to find it: English translation by BC Novels | donghua season 1

Trigger warnings for: graphic descriptions of suffering, non-con of the "fuck or die" variety, and body horror...I can't think of anything else rn?)

Plot: SVSSS is MXTX's first novel, and is a satire of classic stag harem novels. Shen Yuan, the protagonist and half the main ship, is reading a serialized web novel by "Airplane Shooting Towards the Sky" about a demon named Luo Binghe who has a harem of over 3,000 women and has done all kinds of ghastly awful things. He hates this novel but has read all, like, 3 million words of it or something, and trolls every chapter...until one gets him so angry that he dies...and then he wakes up in the book right around when the book starts, in the body of one of the early antagonists, a cultivator named Shen Qingqiu who abuses a young, innocent Luo Binghe physically and emotionally and, ultimately, is horribly tortured to death. Shen Yuan, in Shen Qingqiu's body, thus sets out to not be horribly tortured to death by Luo Binghe. Hijinks ensue.

My Take: In terms of my opinion of it...SVSSS secured for me that MXTX is a much more brilliant author than I thought when I'd only read MDZS. She understands tropes and subverts them brilliantly throughout the story, and from a writing standpoint, I was impressed with her. However, from a plot standpoint...she's got all the ideas but hasn't, imo, yet figured out how exactly to bring them all together. The pacing is off at times, and the ending felt abrupt to me. It's also the only danmei I've read where I ship a side ship more than the primary one (which is, of course, Shen Yuan (as Shen Qingqiu)/Luo Binghe. (also, oops...I read SVSSS after TGCF and just put them in the wrong order, oh well, not gonna change it now.)

Relationship Dynamic: In terms of relationship weirdness...it's hard to sort in that regard, because, like, it's supposed to be weird? I think it's a really interest book but I'm not sure I'd recommend it in your situation. Bingqiu's main dynamic is...uh...tolerance and obsession? They're kinda hard to describe. Shen Yuan often seems like he's just kinda putting up with Luo Binghe, whereas Luo Binghe is...god. So hard to describe, lmao. He's a big clumsy ox in a museum full of porcelain dishes and he really, really loves his Shizun. (also note that Shen Qingqiu is Luo Binghe's teacher. They don't get together until after they're not master/student, but if that's not your thing, another reason to avoid.)

3. Tian Guan Ci Fu, by MXTX.

(art is by Starember)

Genre: historical China (loosely), xianxia (note that I'm still figuring out exactly how stuff gets classified so sorry if I get one wrong, but I think I kinda get it???)

Where to Access It: English Translation by the astonishing yummysuika | manhua (this is an official translation by Bilibili! It's a few chapters behind the actual release, but still...) | donghua season 1 is on Netflix | a live action adaptation is juuuuust getting started on script reading and filing

Trigger warnings for: MCD, temporary MCD, body horror, graphic violence, epic levels of mind fuckery, uh...genocide?...again, racism/colorism, probably other stuff, sorry, I can't take as long as I'd like to for this post so I'm not being as thorough as I oughta be.

Plot: TGCF is about Xie Lian, an 800 year old man, and it commences at the moment when, unexpectedly, he ascends to godhood...for the third time. Unfortunately, when he ascends, he accidentally does some damage in Heaven, and he has to repay that, so he gets sent back to earth to deal with a ghost who's been causing some problems. Hijinks ensue...and then fucktons of angst ensue...then more hijinks...then more angst...and basically it broke my heart like four times and I am grateful for it every day? The main ship is Xie Lian and a ghost named Hua Cheng, but it's hard to even talk about without some spoilers because of some identity shenanigans. (they're VERY mildly identity shenanigans, but still).

My Take: So, you asked what my favorite of the danmei novels I've read is? It's TGCF. TGCF is one of my favorite novels ever, and it has a growing fandom, a donghua that's on Netflix, and a live action that's just starting to film. TGCF is the culmination of the skills MXTX developed through her first two works, imo. She clearly plotted it out all from the start, and while Book 1 especially often seems kind of random - lots of elements are introduced and then kinda...apparently...forgotten? And never explained? But she actually DOES bring it ALL together and it's flat-out masterful. I'm a big fan, obviously.

Relationship Dynamic: it again depends on your preferences and what you didn't like about MDZS, and there's no way to talk about it without spoilers, so consider yourselves warned. Xie Lian ascended to godhood first at the age of 17, and right around then he also saved the life of a 10 year old boy...and that boy is Hua Cheng. Hua Cheng is a follower of Xie Lian's, in that Xie Lian is literally a god, and Hua Cheng is literally one of his followers. However, they're separated for almost 800 years, so the age difference is largely irrelevant, and while some people complain about Hua Cheng's behavior being stalkery and obsessive, I honestly think they're dead wrong. It's more like when you read a celebrity/fan AU, and it starts weird, and then they really genuinely fall in love. Like, the fan may have been in love the whole time, and how they felt about the celebrity before they really met might feel slightly ooky, but it's how they act AFTER they meet their idol that matters more, and...yeah, Hua Cheng is great, they're both great, antis fight me. Xie Lian is easily one of my favorite characters EVER, he is all my favorite tropes in one horribly, wonderfully fucked up martyristic idealistic sweet kind laid back package. I would kill for him, lmao. In terms of their relationship dynamic...they love and respect each other? There's really nothing that weird about it other than the aspects of the "fan" Hua Cheng that get revealed over time - and he's always terrified that when Xie Lian realizes what a fanboy he was, Xie Lian will be upset or disgusted, but of course Xie Lian never is. They adore each other. It's glorious. Highly recommend. :D There's also no explicit content in TGCF (unlike MXTX's other two books).

4. The Husky and His White Cat Shizun (aka 2ha) by Meatbun Doesn't Eat Meat.

Genre: original world, xianxia, time travel, dimension hopping, it's so many things, 2ha is so hard to describe lmao

Where to Access it: English Translation by the amazing yummysuika (things are complicated, though, and it's not finished) | a manhua is in the works and should be out this year | a live action called "Hao Yixing" or "Immortality" is already filmed and could theoretically air literally any time cause it's completely ready, but when will it actually come? Who knows!

Trigger warnings: all of them. Literally. MCD, temporary MCD, murder, suicide, suicidal ideation, suicide attempt, rape/non-con, abuse, manipulation, gas lighting, torture, graphic violence, body horror, literal graphic onscreen horrible blood murder of a small child (I had to skip that chapter), teacher/student relationship sort of but not exactly, probably other stuff, this book is dark as fuck, and a lot of these tags apply to behavior of one half of the main ship toward the other, but...it's complicated, and there are reasons things happen, and those reasons aren't "well they're just a bad person."

Plot: This is another one that's hard to describe because there's sooooo much mind fuckery going on, but I'll try. 2ha is about Mo Ran, who rises to be the Emperor of the World, Taxian Jun, but slaughtering all who oppose him...and who is so miserable that he commits suicide, only to wake up in his 16 year old body. This is pretty much perfect from Mo Ran's point of view, because he's gone back so far that the love of his life, his fellow disciple Shi Mei, is still alive. He has a chance to fix everything that went wrong, starting with preventing his awful evil Shizun, Chu Wanning, from letting Shi Mei die.

Spoilers: the main ship in this book is Mo Ran/Chu Wanning.

Hijinks do NOT ensue. There are no hijinks in 2ha. It is all pain all the time (but I swear it ends happy).

My Take: ...well, from a structural standpoint there are some pacing issues. The book is incredibly long (over 300 chapters, over 1 million words) and there are definitely some chunks that could just be excised and it'd still be fine. However, other than that, it's pretty amazing and absolutely masterful how it's plotted. As a reader you'll spend 100+ chapters thinking you know what's going on, and who the good guys are, and who the bad guys are, and how they relate to each other...and then Meatbun starts in on revealing what's ACTUALLY going on and she then spends 200 chapters repeatedly punching you in the face! Like, I went in knowing a LOT of spoilers, because the tags were so dark that I felt that for my mental health it was important I have a general idea what was going on, and I STILL ended up sobbing my eyes out (and I am NOT an easy crier and don't usually cry at books) over something I knew was coming.

Relationship Dynamic: That's about the only thing that the title accurately conveys about this book. "The Husky and His White Cat Shizun," sounds so soft and fluffy, right? That's how they get you, ha. But, Mo Ran is absolutely a big dumb husky who wants to do the right thing (well, sometimes he does) but just completely fails depressingly often. When he sees someone he likes come in the front door he WILL jump all over them and bark in their face as his way of trying to communicate affection. And Chu Wanning is equally absolutely a cat. He is emotionally constipated, poor at expressing himself, uptight, touch starved, desperate for affection, and so lonely my chest hurts when I think about him. And for how they relate to each other...well, picture that big dog greeting a loved one at the door...except that loved one is the most hide-bound proud white cat you can imagine.

That's their dynamic.

(However, also...there are multiple timelines at play, and Taxian Jun does some truly awful things to "his" Chu Wanning in the original timeline, and many of these things are graphically described, and while it's ultimately all explained, it still all HAPPENS, so if you're going to have trouble reading fucktons of abuse between the main ship, I would not recommend this book)

5. Thousand Autumns (Qianqiu) by Meng Xi Shi.

Genre: historical China (like, references actual people, as far as I can tell), xianxia

Where to Access it: ...reading Thousand Autumns is HARD, it's split over like four websites/translators. This Carrd can kinda help? I can get you the rest if you want | donghua season 1 | I heard there's a live action in the works? But I don't know more than that.

Trigger warnings: graphic violence, mentions/threats of sexual violence (but it's all stopped before things really go wrong), starvation, description of child death (from starvation), near-death, emotional/mental abuse, major semi-permanent character injury, god, minor character death, they're major characters depending on your pov, I can't actually think of others, after writing about 2ha it feels positively fluffy). Note that there's not really any explicit content, just implications of smut, and not til basically the very end and extras.

Plot: Yan Wushi, sect leader of a demonic sect, has just come out of an extended seclusion to improve his cultivation when he and one of his disciples come across a man who is wounded to the point of near death. This turns out to be Shen Qiao, the sect leader of Mount Xuandu. When Shen Qiao awakens from his wounds, he's lost his memory, AND he's blind, and Yan Wushi decides it would be great fun and an excellent use of his time to fuck with Shen Qiao by trying to turn him evil - because Yan Wushi is certain that ALL people are inherently evil, and shattering Shen Qiao's veneer of righteousness will just help prove that.

Spoilers: it's not a veneer.

Not spoilers: Not many hijinks ensue, but there are a few hijinks, and even when it's not hijinxed, it's still not that painful...usually.

My Take: despite that synopsis, a lot of the plot of Thousand Autumns is actually political, and I like political plots, so I liked that aspect of it. However, it has some serious pacing issues imo, and it's also hard to read in English atm because it's not fully translated; it's close, now, much closer than when I read it a few months ago, so it'll be easier to read soon. Or maybe I shouldn't say it's pacing problems, but rather, it's more of a sequence of multiple major plots, strung together, with the growing relationship between Yan Wushi and Shen Qiao playing out in the background. I think if I'd known there was no "one big plot" that would have actually helped me, because it kept feeling like, "Oh, THIS is the main thing," but it never was. Things would feel climactic...except then there'd be more. So it's probably better to actually think of it as more...episodic? And the episodes/stories build, and interrelate, and do have a culmination, but not all of them directly tie in, and not all the threads end up coming together/getting resolved.

Relationship Dynamic: early on, Yan Wushi is definitely abusive and manipulative, intentionally so, and I would argue that, imo, Shen Qiao falls for it. However, mid-way through, there's some big reveals, and after that when they're reunited Shen Qiao no longer takes any shit and Yan Wushi continues to act like he doesn't care even when he clearly does. They're not a typical ship in ANY WAY, and I'd say their relationship is more founded on mutual respect than on love. Indeed, in the author's notes at one point MXS actually says they doesn't see them as the kind of couple to ever exchange love declarations, and I thought that was really interesting and it really helped me to understand how they worked together because I'll own I struggled with at times. Yan Wushi is self-interested, often cruel, and ethically and morally dubious. Shen Qiao, on the other hand, could probably ascend to Daoist godhood, he's so pure. Yet...they DO work. I'd say "opposites attract" but that's ALSO not their main trope, not exactly. They're a VERY hard ship to explain, and I know some people who've read the whole book and still don't really...get them...and I've had to really think about them to wrap my head around them...but the more I've thought about them, the more I like them.

6. Those Years in Quest of Honor Mine by Man Man He Qi Duo.

Genre: historical fiction set in either actual China or make-believe China, I'm not sure if this is directly incorporated any real people

Where to Access It: English Translation by Perpetual Daydreams | manhua (untranslated, I'm not sure if there's anyone translating it into English) | I think there's a live action in the works? Not sure beyond that though.

Trigger Warnings: suicide attempts, suicidal ideation, drug addiction, drug abuse, chronic illness (different character than the drugs), manipulation, abusive, awful parents and parental figures (not all, but definitely some), some homophobia (but way less than there could have been), probably other stuff

Plot: After 7 years away, Zhong Wan returns to the capital of the Empire with the three children of his benefactor, the seven-years-dead Prince Ning. Prince Ning was executed for treason against the previous Emperor, and Zhong Wan has done all he can to protect and raise the three kids, but he's got a lot of worries about returning to the capital and what could happen to his charges if they get pulled into the politics surrounded the Emperor. But, even worse, he's got even more worries about being reunited with Yu She, nephew of the Emperor, with whom he has more than a little history...and about whom he has been lying for the past 7 years, claiming that he is Yu She's lover, in a bid to help use Yu She's reputation to protect Prince Ning's children.

Hijinks ensue.

And so does a political nightmare.

My Take: TYQHM was a hard book to get into because there are just so many characters and it's all about politics - this is NOT a xianxia or wuxia novel, and these characters are NOT cultivators. There's basically nothing supernatural in the whole book; instead, it's about Zhong Wan and Yu She figuring out their own histories, and accepting each other, while trying to survive in a political world that increasingly wants both of them dead. However, I adore political plots, and when all was said and done I really enjoyed it, and I'm trying tooth and nail to claw other people into the fandom with me, so far with basically no success. It only has like 15 works in English on AO3. And so not only does it not fit that requirement of yours...

Relationship Dynamic: ...I think you would also probably not like the relationship dynamic? Zhong Wan is a bit like Wei Wuxian-as-Mo Xuanyu, except more...genuinely? Like, it's his actual personality, not an act, in quite the same way. I don't mean the "flamboyantly gay" part...usually...he definitely has his moments...but he's just...like, he's been through so much that he'll basically say anything, and drag himself entirely through the mud, to distract people who might hurt the three kids (they're like 16, 13, 13, now I think? It was never THAT clear to me, tbh...certainly, all are at least 10...) and, later, Yu She. He has zero face, and doesn't mind having negative face when he feels the situation demands it...and Yu She, on the other hand, has MAJOR depression issues, is sure he deserves nothing, and mostly wants to destroy everyone around him and then kill himself, at least until Zhong Wan starts giving him a reason to live again. But, more than that...Zhong Wan is like the fucking epitome of a bratty subby bottom. He wants to get fucked SO bad. And Yu She is an incredibly reluctant dom, hilariously so at times, uncomfortably/manipulative so at others. When all was said and done, I was pretty fond of them both, but there were definitely moments that made me grimace, and given what you say of how you felt about MDZS, I think this one is less likely to be to your taste?

Bonus 7: Guardian by Priest. I never finished the novel version of Guardian because the translation had some issues that caused me not to enjoy it, so I won't get into it too much, but again, Guardian is a very different book than any of the others, because it's modern fantasy(ish, like, it's still deeply embedded in Daoist-related tropes but it's more "magic spells" and less "cultivation." Like, in terms of what it's like, it felt more like Japanese modern Onmyoji style stories, to me, than it felt like the ancient Chinese wuxia/xianxia cultivation stories.). I'm not gonna get into lots of details, because I read part of the book more than a year ago, and have seen the show (which is VERY different) like three times, so I can hardly even remember what they're like in the novel. There was definitely some weirdness, though? If you're potentially interested, I'd suggest starting with the drama instead. The plot for that is...

Plot: Zhao Yunlan heads a Special Investigation Unit in the human world tasked with maintaining a treaty between humans and the dixigren ("undergrounders") who are (in the show) aliens (in the book...it's the world of the dead). While doing this job, he keeps running into this professor, Shen Wei, who definitely knows more than he oughta.

Hijinks ensue.

And then it murders you with feels.

The live action streams from YouTube - here.

(Warning: uh, I don't want to give spoilers, but my "guaranteed happy ending" does NOT apply to the Guardian TV show...but it does apply to the book, as I understand it.)

*

Anyway, this was a terrible use of my time but it was definitely more fun than what I should be doing, and it's probably way more information than you wanted or needed, but since I wasn't sure what exactly you had in mind, I figured...might as well be thorough?

(Today's hyper-focus fail: this post, ha...)

[eldritch-elrics]

svsss: shen qingqiu corpse hot potato (among other things)

so i actually read all this last week and then forgot to finish my post about it but?? here you go. more commentary!

got all the way to chapter 57 and shit is getting wack

“it wasn’t sqq’s first time being kissed” please we need more than little tidbits of shen yuan backstory i want to know more

honestly i’m dying over the commotion over sqq’s corpse. binghe you are so weird (affectionate). really xuexiao’ing it up in here

(for the hundredth time, binghe go to therapy challenge)

sqq holding his own corpse djkhgsds

also oho, beginnings of sqq sexuality crisis: he says he’s definitely straight right now but hmmmmm. we shall see

in general it’s so funny that he’s now Remembered Gay People Exist and it’s just shattered his whole worldview

binghe is seriously so emotionally constipated. he’s getting better at revealing his true feelings and not going the route of either “being too cold” or “straight up lying about his situation” but still.... man. they’ve got soooo much work to do on their communication still lol

oh also!! sqq finally realizing that his lbh is different from og!lbh! and that he shouldn’t just treat him as a character in a novel! that’s progress!!!

i think it would make sense for their respective development to involve like... learning to stop objectifying each other? sqq’s gotten pretty far with this, as his reason for helping binghe now is less out of self-preservation instinct and more out of compassion. i’m comparing it to the places in the beginning where sqq threw lbh in front of monsters and stuff, knowing he’d survive because ~plot armor~ but not considering how lbh might have felt about that.

that same theme even shows up in like jinlan city/the water prison, in the parts where i was complaining about sqq making the system solve problems for him instead of solving problems for himself. because he saw binghe as a problem to be solved with game mechanics rather than with interpersonal skills

it’s really interesting! personally i find sqq’s actions easy to understand/ “justify” but he’s certainly wronged binghe and he’s realizing that now. character development! i really like how the meta stuff plays into it

so! zhuzhi-lang! plothole filling!!!

i knew the snake in the cave was gonna come back :3

i have Thoughts about him and tianlang-jun but i’ll get to that in a moment

so we’ve gone from “rumors about bingqiu fucking” to “an entire ballad about bingqiu fucking” and wow. that is so much. loving sqq’s reactions

if sqq was on tumblr he’d have “do not interact if you support rpf” somewhere on his blog

i like that you can rent swords

the scene with lbh facing off with the peak lords!!! oh man!!!!! emotions

yue qingyuan has huge lan xichen vibes

so has lbh known sqq was alive ever since sha hualing brought him to him? it was a little unclear how long he’s known

SO happy to see shang qinghua again. my BOY. sqq is so fucking mad at him kjhsdjhgjhsds

mobei-jun just fucking tossing him into the center of the room lmao

so i had to switch translations because the one i was reading was unfinished! the other one seems pretty good too though

but it censors swear words :(

also i think it’s interesting that it calls it the sun moon dew seed/plant/flower? instead of mushroom? i guess 芝 (which is afaik a character used to describe it) is ambiguous enough..... idk i went on a bit of a research binge about this the other day lmao because i liked the mushroom plot thing so much

finally sqq is like “alright. i made this mess with lbh so i’m gonna fix it by going with him.” woooo we love character development

poor dude in house arrest though lol. this is not really a great situation and i totally understand why sqq is upset

so i’m not a huge fan of how possessive the love interests of mxtx novels are? like i get it, i know the relationships aren’t supposed to be realistic or totally healthy or whatever, but it’s not my thing. so i hope lbh grows out of it? or at least out of this toxic iteration of it

SQH VISIT HELL YES... MY DUDE...

trash man i love him so much. he’s like. totally rooting for bingqiu to happen it’s so funny. oh and he’s absolutely jealous as well (didn’t it already get established that binghe has a huge dick? well. hmm.)

poor guy lost his cool outline :( was forced to write a shitty harem novel :( the injustice of it all. no one has suffered more than airplane :(

jokes aside i LOVE how he's this.. passionate author who had to tone down the interesting-ness of his ideas because of what his readers wanted. makes him a little bit more sympathetic

ok back to bingqiu. this scene was interesting because i can see where both of them are coming from. both of them have lied to each other! and finally lbh is doing some apologizing

and then they have their whole fucking tussle on the bed which was definitely a little uncomfy (binghe use your words challenge! not everything can be solved by ripping open your crush’s shirt!) but also really hilarious???? idek. they’re just like. wrestling. and lbh likes being hit. ok kinky bitch <3

idk, this was one of the scenes i was warned about because Iffy Consent, and i agree it’s iffy, but personally i didn’t find it that upsetting at all? it seemed pretty clear that binghe was just being dramatic for the hell of it and i wasn’t worried that he’d actually do anything sqq was not ok with. (apart from, yknow, the whole house arrest thing in general lol.) i think i’ve heard there’s some more dubious stuff later on - interested to see what i’ll think of that. really there is so much already that’s fucked up about their relationship - at this point i’m just along for the ride! it’s like that post that’s like “why must a relationship be healthy is it not enough to see two fictional people destroy each other” or whatever it was

anyway. omg sqq back in his old body!!!

i’m actually very surprised about this. the mushroom body had so much spiritual energy and now it’s just... gone? guess they’ll have to find another way to solve the xin mo thing

poor binghe had to see his shizun fucking rot before his eyes though??? man. i want to draw that now

thought: is zhuzhi-lang's whole character just puppeted by the system in order to fill plot holes?

OKAY SO TIANLANG-JUN

he’s funny. and very calm. just sittin in a coffin! i like that

other than that i have mixed feelings. on the one hand i feel like he is a pretty good villain - i love that the system is actually making sqq fix plot holes, and i love that TLJ was the big bad of airplane’s original draft, and “i need to steal my son’s body in order to come back to life properly” is great (i’m always up for fucky body swap stuff)

on the other hand, it feels a little bit late in the story to introduce a major villain. i would have liked to see a LOT more foreshadowing on this - more talking about tlj (maybe in a way that assumes he’s not a threat but makes it clear he’s going to be important), more of the system getting sqq to fix more minor plotholes, etc

however some parts of it do work as a pretty good twist! especially the realization that zzl is the one who started the jinlin city sqq callout party!!! that’s pretty fun, and makes a lot of sense :0

oh i also like that tlj is like “no what i like humans i’m not gonna wipe them out! i just don’t like the sects”

now i don’t think this is going to happen but i think it would be very fun if tlj had some sort of fourth wall awareness and was siding with sqq for meta reasons to take down the protagonist

so binghe daddy issues huh

i made a post on this already but freud would love him. no wonder lbh got so attached to sqq......

now that i’ve remembered sv exists i’m gonna read more :0 excited to see what happens next!

[myfriendsarerealidiots]

Since the TGCF donghua came out a week or so ago and the SVSSS one is almost ending, I’m still very much hungover with MXTX so time for a decently long ramble.

Let’s. Talk. About. MXTX. And. Flashbacks.

Now, do I enjoy flashbacks? Absolutely..not.

Do I think it’s a cheat way to tell stories in the past? You bet your ass I do.

But. Do I understand why they’re being used? Yep.

I previously mentioned here, that my first exposure to any of MXTX’s work was through ‘The Untamed.’ Which was basically a flashback for three-forths of it’s duration. I hated it so much because it introduced me to the current situation of Lan Zhan, Jiang Cheng and the newly reincarnated Wei Ying and then completely forgets about that for the next 30 or so episodes.

Now, I’m not your typical viewer per se, I think that I look at things a little too much and was able to infer most of what happened in Wei Ying’s past from just the first few episodes of flashback. Therefore, I was extremely boreded out of my wits as I treaded through the remainder with my only encouragement being reaching the end of the flashback. Which sucked because upon reading the novel for MDZS, it was way less flashback that the webdrama and I enjoyed it even more then.

Ok, moving onto the next novel in the line~ actually wait let’s not just yet because after I finished MDZS, I read TGCF in little under 2 weeks. As much as I absolutely love the story of TGCF, I also think it is the worst offender of the flashback issue I have with MXTX minus ‘The Untamed’ which can just be its own category.

Instead, lemme chat for a bit about SVSSS or Scum Villain—the first, shortest, and funniest novel written by MXTX.

I just want to say outright—Scum Villain doesn’t have any flashbacks. All of BingHe’s childhood? That wasn’t a flashback because we had current-day BingHe interacting with it. QingQiu? His story was explained by..the transmigrated QingQiu.

Shen QingQiu is the narrator of Scum Villain. Everything is from his perspective which 1. Makes everything hilarious af and 2. Is very straightforward. He is a straightforward thinker and therefore, besides his occasional internal panic attacks and anything that has to do with Post-Abyss BingHe, everything he thinks about is surface level. No complex depressions like in TGCF which I’ll touch on later. No weird intertwining relationships between characters either. And that all makes the story very forward in a sense. The only direction it goes in is forward, it doesn’t go backwards to look at the past.

Ah, time for my favorite out of the 3, TGCF or Tian Guang Ci Fu. Did anyone tell you that it has 2 entire books devoted to flashbacks? Cause no one told me. Anyways, TGCF. The story of a Ghost King who stal—I mean loves a God over 800 years.

Firstly, I want to say that book 2 was completely pointless. Everything described in that book was already mentioned in past conversations or implied through dialogue. I guess it’s important if you take it as context for book 4 which is where all the angsty stuff happens but for the most part, you can probably skip book 2 and still understand most of the lore of this story.

While reading book 2, if I’m not mistaken, the only thing I had in my mind was ‘This kid is probably Hua Cheng, what did Xie Lian do to switch their luck?’ And that was it.

When I got to book 4, however, was when all the tears started coming out.

Before I continue, I want to say that I had no knowledge of any plot elements of TGCF past Hua Cheng and Xie Lian getting together in the end.

Now then, when Xie Lian freed that little ghost fire, I started crying in realization especially after the words they shared. When it stayed with him as he got himself drunk in despair, when it cried for him as he got stabbed at the mercy of the ones he wanted to protect and when it disappeared, each time it made me cry because it hurt so much. And it got worse as Xie Lian became the White-Clothed Calamity and he donned the smiley-face mask. Layer by layer, it built up my emotions and eventually I was just left with a soggy pillow.

^^excuse my ramble there but I think that despite the flashback element to it, book 4 is one of the saddest moments in all of her(?) work.

At the end of all this, I still kinda hate flashbacks if it’s like book 2 of TGCF or ‘The Untamed’ but some are kinda worth reading.

Anyways, thanks for reading my ramble. I hope I didn’t take up too much of your feed.

Oh! Right. If you guys have any HuaLian wallpapers without them...kissing can you send them to me? I’m trying to find one for my ipad that won’t get me disowned for being a fujoshi. P.S I wrote this quite a while ago and forgot to post it lol. The tgcf and svsss donghuas have already finished and s3 of the mdzs one has a trailer released as of me posting this.

[spockandawe]

Writing meta asks: 3, 7, 10, 17, and 20? (I'm so sorry for sending so many, this was an interesting ask set!)

Hahaha, no worries at all! Since I just covered 3, let’s see about these others :D

7. What do you think are the characteristics of your personal writing style? Would others agree?

Oh man, this one always stumps me. The easy answer is that my writing is characterized by being in second person, unless I am dragged kicking and screaming to another pov XD But more in the spirit of the original question, I have... heard that a thing about my writing that stands out to people is good dialog exchanges. It’s kind of wild to me, because I feel like I spend a lot of time struggling to exit characters’ heads and advance the story, lmao. I would be curious to hear from anyone with opinions on this, what’s distinctive about my writing from an outside pov, because from the inside, I cannot tell at all XD

10. How would you describe your writing process?

I think usually when I start, I’ve got some scene that stands out very clearly in my head, either as a visual, or as an audible conversation (sometimes it’s more than one scene, and you get something like the tianlang-jun verse, or the diet bingge, and scope spirals out of my control). But most of the writing is an attempt to get to that scene that hit me really hard, and to make it hit the reader strongly too. But the actual writing process... mostly I write short fics, so I start at a plausible onboarding point, and go until it stops. If it’s longer, I start at the beginning and go until my attention span fails me, then organize my notes into something semi-coherent, and start writing at whatever point catches my eye, until I edit the whole together :V

(somewhere I’ve got a draft saved for an ask meme about specific fics, and things like inspiration/process/favorite moment/etc. I need to dig that out at some point, because I have a tough time talking in generalities, but I love talking in specifics XD I’ll try to find that, but honestly, my inbox is always open to people asking about my stories)

17. Do you think readers perceive your work - or you - differently to you? What do you think would surprise your readers about your writing or your motivations?

Ooh, wow. Hm. This is a really interesting question. Man, I want to give this a really thoughtful, well-thought-out answer, but I am absolutely terrible at gauging how other people perceive anything ever XD I occasionally get comments that seem to think I’m dunking on a less-than-sympathetic character who I actually love deeply, but those are pretty rare. My writing and motivations.... I don’t know! I think there aren’t that many unplumbed depths there. I’m not a terribly symbolic writer, I can maybe noodle for longer than people expect about characters’ inner worlds and what they were thinking/feeling in my fics, but I don’t think that’s much of a surprise to anyone who’s followed me for long, haha

20. Tell us the meta about your writing that you really want to ramble to people about (symbolism you’ve included, character or relationship development that you love, hidden references, callbacks or clues for future scenes?)

Oh boy, I did not read ahead XDDD Uhmmm, let me see. I guess a major part of most of my longer wips right now is... Shen Jiu. I’ve rambled about him before, but I just want to scream about him all the time, because he’s absolutely terrible to Luo Binghe. He does awful, unnecessary, cruel things to him. I want to get Luo Binghe out of his hands asap, in any given setting (except the diet bingge verse, lmao), and then I want to devote lots and lots of energy to exploring his emotional world and damage and giving him something better. Because this man is miserable! Some of it is self-inflicted, some of it isn’t, and even if he’s not in a downward emotional spiral, he’s like.... an emotional ouroboros, hovering at a pretty miserable place. He’s not going to break free on his own, and he’s not going to let anybody break him free if he can help it, and it sucks, it’s terrible, it’s miserable for both him and the people around him! And. AND. I don’t want to just tell people all about how tragic his life is (though I will absolutely do that too), I want to show them the trapped feeling, the suffocating unhappiness, all of it. I feel like it’s a lot more compelling to read through that kind of situation than to just be told about it, and I really, really do want to (over the course of multiple fics and verses) communicate the... tragedy of his existence, while also finding ways to reach down into that pit and lift him up. It’s important to me.

adfasgd that’s a mildly incoherent note to end on. Here’s a different favorite thing! In the diet bingge verse, even after shen jiu becomes binghe’s second husband, they both insist (and believe) that they hate each other, and that the other one is the worst. however, in a drugged-up haze, sha yuan (third husband) is going to insist, within hearing of both of them, that shen qingqiu is the love of binghe’s life. This will mortify and horrify both of them, they will both be appalled, and mutually decide never to speak of this again. However, he’s also.......... not exactly wrong. Nobody is ever going to admit this out loud, but in a crisis, Binghe’s first instinct is to seek out Shizun before anyone else. This has the bonus effect that Shen Qingqiu will immediately start hunting for ANY OTHER HUSBAND to take a panicking Binghe off his hands, which is Binghe’s excuse if anyone ever calls him out on it, but... he never really stopped thinking that Shizun was the most clever, most capable person alive, and his first instinct in a real crisis is to look to Shen Qingqiu as a dependable waypoint to orient himself on. ‘Love’ isn’t exactly the right word, but I’m not sure there’s a better word, and sha yuan is just muttering to himself like ‘i fucking told you so’

[mirai-eats]

Rewind and Start Over:: Mid-Afternoon

Bingqiu, rated M, 5,381 words, part 3/5, Incomplete

Angst, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, re-transmigration, Angst with a Happy Ending, Rating May Change

Modern science is so good it kept a dead man alive.

Shen Yuan is dragged forward but his feet are stubbornly digging in the ground. Luo Binghe is running as fast as he can to catch up.

-

Luo Binghe is adjusting and Shen Yuan is conflicted.

read on AO3

It was a douse of hot water to find Binghe standing at his door, towered above in his midnight black glory, his hair even wilder than he could recall and redwood eyes sunk deep into his tired face. He was frozen in the spot, had half out as if he wanted more than anything to grab Shen Yuan and pull him back into his arms. He wanted him to do it. 

“Sh-shizun?” Luo Binghe said hesitantly. His face. He has a different face, one that could not hide his emotions as well as Shen Qingqiu’s naturally cold mask.

“Binghe, it’s me,” Shen Yuan gulped and shakily climbed to his feet. After all this time, after all the waiting, he was finally here to take him back but only after he’d finally fixed his gaze to the approaching horizon instead of checking every second to see if Luo Binghe had followed him. The luggage his sister had bought him was sitting as a painful reminder in the living room; of how he was paying to leave Luo Binghe behind for good. “It’s Shizun.” He pulled his spine taught, and fixed his best cool and collected immortal Shen Qingqiu mask over his face. He’d been practicing, but he wasn’t nearly as good as the original. 

There was a moment before the dams broke and tears flooded Luo Binghe’s eyes and his face scrunched up in what would be an ugly, twisted mess, but he was still very handsome. “Shizun!” He sobbed and with all his demon strength, he gathered Shen Yuan into his arms and held him close. “Shizun, Shizun, Shizun!” 

Ignoring the painful cracking of his spine, he reached up and wrapped his arms around Luo Binghe’s broad shoulders, the width spanning larger than he remembered and his head pressed firmly into his chest. His original body is smaller than Shen Qingqiu’s, less lean and more skin on bones and vertically challenged, perhaps that’s why he felt so large. Luo Binghe was bigger than him before but now it felt as if he was being wrapped in a sticky, heated Binghe blanket. 

“Binghe I-” he choked off, his heart overflowing with the year and a half he spent missing, yearning, for him. 

“Is it really you, Shizun?” 

“It’s me, I promise it’s me.”

Luo Binghe seemed to sink into him, letting his wound-up joints relax and rested his weary weight on Shen Yuan’s body. His hands gripped the back of his jacket so tight, shaking with unbridled emotions, Shen Yuan swore it might tear the fabric. 

The words he wanted to say were caught in his throat. The nights he had spent staring up at his pale ceiling with the street lights ruining the opaque night and the seamless noise pollution disrupting however much sound of Binghe’s voice he could recollect. Hours and days and weeks and months spent with a weight on his chest that he couldn’t pull off and now it was forced into his lungs waiting for him to-

To do what?

Tears blurred his vision. He wants Shen Qingqiu’s face back. 

They pulled each other into Shen Yuan’s room, which he noticed was much neater than when he’d left it that morning. Finals were just beyond the horizon and the looming threat had left him careless in taking care of himself and his space. He only caught a glimpse of it before Luo Binghe had walked them back to the bed and tumbled down onto the Tempurpedic mattress, sinking into he duvet with a soft gasp of surprise from Luo Binghe. His body was still pressed firmly against Shen Yuan’s, arms wrapped around his narrow frame with no will to let him go. 

Simply relishing in their warmth was what they needed right now. Shen Yuan stroked his tear-stained cheeks and brushed stray locks from his brow, the glimmering demon mark tempted him to bring his lips down to a soothing kiss, which he gave into easily, to the first kiss in so, so long. Luo Binghe sighed into his hold, his eyes fluttering under his tender touch, long fingers stroking a pattern in the small of Shen Yuan’s back.

Neither wanted to break the peace and neither dared to try.

---

It was later after Shen Yuan let his heavy head rest on Luo Binghe’s warm chest and dozed for a bit did he curse the phone alarm that went off to remind him to get ready for work. Luo Binghe half sat up with him and glared at the phone in his hand.

��Give me a second, Binghe,” Shen Yuan painfully extracted himself from Luo Binghe’s warmth. “I need to clear something up.”

He stepped out of the room, leaving the door open and himself in view for Binghe’s sake and quietly called his work to use up a little of his sick hours to ditch his short closing shift. With an apology, he hung up and went back into the room. He finally peeled off his jacket, his skin feeling toasty from intensely cuddling Binghe. He crawled back into bed and felt Binghe’s eyes lingering on his exposed arms. 

“What?” He asked, flushing under his gaze.

“This place, tell me about it,” Luo Binghe said slowly. “It’s… different. You’re different.”

Ah. “I- well, you’ve probably figured it out but this is where I’m from.”

Luo Binghe nodded. “Shang Qinghua told me you two transmigrated into our world he wrote, but that’s it.”

Shen Yuan breathed, sitting up from his warmth and proceeded to tell Luo Binghe everything. The System isn’t here to deduct points as he’s technically offline, so he was free to tell him everything that’s been gnawing at his bones since day one. His old life as Shen Yuan, a second-generation third son with too much time on his hands and a heart too weak to keep him going, his brutal curses and a fading death that lead him to rewrite the novel. His requirements, the tasks he had to complete.

Luo Binghe was crying, full-blown sobs toward the end when he told him about how he had no choice but to push him and Bingge came from a System punishment meant to kill him originally.

“If Shizun had asked,” he wept, “I would have jumped into the Endless Abyss a thousand times and more if its to save you.”

“I couldn’t,” Shen Yuan wiped away his hot tears. These weren’t his crocodile tears used to pull and push Shen Yuan around. “That was dangerous, too. The condition of the System is that I must never speak of it and never imply your world was a novel or I would have died again.”

“The other Shen Qingqiu, from the other me’s world,” Luo Binghe started. “Is…?” He could almost see the original good’s limbless, blind body dangling reflecting in Luo Binghe’s star shine eyes.

Shen Yuan nodded. “Yes. That’s why I ran away.”

A fresh wave of salty tears broke dripped down Luo Binghe’s sobbing face and he pulled Shen Yuan into a crushing hug. “I would never! I could never hurt you! I don’t even want to think of hurting you!” He cried his big, fat tears into the thin cotton of his shirt. 

Shen Yuan hugged him back tighter, his usually shy exterior thrown away for the moment only to soak up his Binghe. They sank back into each other’s arms and felt the dripping daylight fade to molten gold and then a sleepy grey, the only sound besides the constant city humming was their sweet whispers, old endearments they swore they would never be able to say again, and hushed cries when their hearts grew too full. 

---

“My name is Shen Yuan.” 

Luo Binghe nodded. “May Shizun… allow this lowly disciple to call you as such?” 

“I would rather you call me that than Shizun here.” He could feel the flush staining his cheeks.

“A-Yuan,” Luo Binghe murmured, slipping his arms around his waist from behind. He pressed a kiss to his nape, relished into the hitched gasp from Shen Yuan’s throat. “I called you A-Jiu once and you didn’t like it and I thought you didn’t want to get that close with me, but now it all makes much more sense. It was never your name.”

“Yeah uh, please let go just for now? I need to move around.” Shen Yuan ducked out of Luo Binghe’s corded arms and went back to the stovetop where he was making dinner.

“I’m sorry, A-Yuan, please continue.” Luo Binghe stepped back into his space and with a large hand placed on the small of Shen Yuan’s back, he leaned in and closely watched Shen Yuan mix together the last of the vegetables into the fried rice. “This disciple wishes to learn how to utilize your kitchen in order to make you excellent meals again. But I also don’t mind A-Yuan cooking for me, too.” 

“This is the only thing I know how to make besides a mean scrambled egg,” Shen Yuan said. “It’s not the best tasting fried rice, my brother makes it so much better.” 

To prove his point, he turned off the heat and served the lackluster fried rice into bowls, shuffling awkwardly around the already too-small kitchen with Binghe latched to his side. He served it at his kitchen bar with mismatching cups of his favorite iced jasmine tea and with a flourish presented his go-to meal to his husband. 

Luo Binghe’s eyes sparkled and dove right into the bland meal, the eggs a little too jiggly for comfort and the vegetables almost tasteless from being overcooked. A crunch of undercooked rice hit Shen Yuan’s molars and he did his best to bury his face into his bowl so Luo Binghe didn’t need to see the face of the man who made the pathetic meal. How could he compare to the perfect protagonist?! This is a meal he makes to eat alone if he doesn’t want to buy meals at school and work the next day or two! It’s not supposed to be fed to anyone but him, who cares if it tastes good if he's the only one eating his shame?! 

“Shizun this is delicious!” Luo Binghe said between bites, his bowl already almost empty. He scraped the rest of it into his gaping maw, not leaving a single grain of rice behind, and chugged his whole glass of iced tea in one go. “May I have seconds?” His eyes, his smile, was all so bright. A bit of green onion was stuck to the corner of his mouth. 

Shen Yuan felt a warmth in his core melt his aching heart. Of course, he loves it, Shen Yuan could feed him dirt and he’d say it’s the best meal he’s ever had simply because Shen Yuan gave it to him. “Go ahead, have as much as you’d like.” Without thinking, Shen Yuan reached over and picked the green onion from Luo Binghe’s mouth. 

“I almost missed a bit, thank you Shizun.” And with no shame, Luo Binghe leaned in and took the fingers that’d pinched the green onion from his face and licked them into his mouth. 

“Shameless,” Shen Yuan hissed, his thin face flaming. 

“I will not let a scrap of my A-Yuan’s hard work go to waste.” As if to prove his point, he rose and piled himself another bowl. 

—-

“How are we going to get you back?” Luo Binghe asked. 

Shen Yuan froze at his laptop, fingers hovering over his keyboard. “I don’t know. I died the first time I transmigrated. There could be a chance it just takes me to die again to go back to Shen Qingqiu’s body, but…” 

“No.” 

“No?” 

“Not unless we’re certain your soul will go back. How did you do it the first time, with the Dew Seed?” 

—-

They decided not to try yet, to take their time working on a solution to get him home without even the slightest chance of failing. Luo Binghe had already tried popping back to their world and grabbing Shen Qingqiu’s body, dropping it on the bed and asking Shen Yuan to get in. 

He asked him instead to put more clothes on him and put him back. He obliged, promising he got the sect lords to take turns daily replenishing Shen Qingqiu’s spiritual energy so he wouldn’t rot away. He didn’t say anything about redressing the body. 

—-

That night they laid curled up into each other in Shen Yuan’s too small bed, sleepy kisses pressed into their skin until they couldn’t anymore. Shen Yuan could smell the horny on Luo Binghe, especially after he unceremoniously shoved his hand down the loose waistband of his pajama pants and was batted away. Another time, he promised. He’s been abstinent for a year and a half, and this body has never felt Luo Binghe before. It would be like the first time. 

“I’m going to class tomorrow, you should stay here and relax-” Shen Yuan started

“Absolutely not.” Luo Binghe left no room to question. Shen Yuan sat up and found Luo Binghe’s face amongst the silvery traces of moonlight bleeding through the blinds. Determination laced the lines of his face and Shen Yuan, unrestricted finally, softly trailed a light finger along his strong jawline. Luo Binghe melted under his touch, but the firmness never left his gaze. 

“You don’t have proper clothes to be going around,” Shen Yuan tried to reason. “I’m only going to my classes, I’ll be home by dinner. You’ll just be bored waiting for me to finish.”

“But I’ll be near you.”

“You’re not allowed in the classroom unless you paid to be there too.”

“I can wait outside.”

“You can wait here.”

---

Home, he realized. He had said “going home” without realizing the true implication. This is his home, this modern China where he had an apartment and a car and a job and so, so close to graduating with his Bachelor’s degree. Shen Yuan is a student and a son, a brother and a friend. His home is where his family is in their lovely manor uptown where lived his mother with her string of pearls necklace gifted to her by his father for their 20th anniversary and his father with his favorite coat with the patches on the elbows like some eccentric literature professor. His eldest brother is going to inherit the company once their father retires, his second brother recently passed the bar exam, and his little sister is working at her first salon as a hairstylist. 

This is a home, but not his home now. His home was now, wrapped in Luo Binghe’s arms as his sleepy breath tickled his neck, his unruly hair brushing his cheek and sticking to his bare arm. There was no rush to go back to the Proud Immortal Demon Way, Shen Yuan felt he was fine where he was now that he at least had Luo Binghe next to him again. He wasn’t shy to whisper a soft “I missed you so much, husband.” into his hair. They needn’t force themselves back so soon when they just found each other again. 

Going home, he’d whispered into countless nights, was going back to Luo Binghe. He didn’t feel the need to rush back just yet.

Besides, Shen Yuan put all this work into this semester so far he wanted to at least finish it off before he disappeared again.

---

Luo Binghe pitifully waved goodbye from the door as he left the next morning a little after dawn, a painfully early morning class that left a sharper burn than usual when he had to leave Luo Binghe behind. He didn’t do any work last night and lugged his laptop case and heavy anthology book with him to school to work on during his break (and during one of his lectures that was a little boring, it wouldn’t affect his grade if he hunched over his laptop in the back the whole time). He’d showed Luo Binghe how to work the TV and where he kept the tea and snacks and, by Luo Binghe’s insistence, his cleaning supplies. 

Coming home a little after four, he found Luo Binghe shaking with unshed tears in the middle of the now spotless living room. 

“This disciple tried going to buy some fresh food to make Shizun a grand dinner today but they wouldn’t take my money and had people take me away when I tried to shove it in their little boxes and take the food anyway. I gave them more than enough but it wasn’t the paper stuff they had so I was forced to leave,” Luo Binghe blubbered, tears now freefalling down his face and dripping across his exquisite black robes. “I’m so sorry, Shizun. I wanted to make sure you ate very good so you can do your work with a full stomach but I can’t even do this for you here.”

Shen Yuan reached up, uncomfortable with how high he had to reach with their new height difference, and patted his lovely husband’s head. “I told you to stay here. I appreciate the effort, Binghe. We can go shopping now, I have the money they use here.” He was between paychecks right now but his credit card was nearly paid off. This constituted as an emergency in his head so figured this should be fine. 

---

First, he found some too big clothes for Luo Binghe to wear. A pair of sweatpants he bought too large for the purpose of wanting to swim in them or when it was really cold he would layer those over a smaller pair of pajama pants. They fit quite snug over Binghe’s figure and considered he might have to go a size or two up to find a pair of pants that would fit. There was a shirt he dug up from the depths of his closet that also fit a little snug, too snug across Luo Binghe’s chest, stretching poor Hatsune Miku’s face into a warped mess. He mentally poured one out for her. A too-big hoodie he had he liked to relax in was thrown over, the sleeves short but it covered how the pants stretched across his firm butt and his too big…. you know. For shoes, he found the sandals his older brother left at his place over the summer, Binghe’s heels slipped off the back but it would do. A beanie was the finishing touch, olive green knit used to cover his demon mark.

He took him to his work, a department store with a little bit of everything (plus his employee discount) and dug through the racks to find the largest size of everything. It took a little too long and he tried to not meet his coworker’s eyes (which he could certainly feel on the back of his head) and pushed himself and Luo Binghe into the fitting room to try it all on. It was a chore showing Luo Binghe how to put everything on and finding what sizes worked best until finally, he had a handful of outfits plus a pair of sneakers, underwear, a soft hoodie, and a baseall cap to cover his forehead. Luo Binghe was nearly vibrating with interest, his head swinging left and right to take everything in.

“A-Yuan would look good in this color.”

“I like this, A-Yuan should get this for himself.”

“A-Yuan. I think you would look good in this.”

He had to restrain Luo Binghe from making him buy more clothes, he was already stretching his budget buying new clothes for Luo Binghe. After almost two hours they shuffled to the register with their armload of clothes to check out. 

“Hey, Shen Yuan.” It was Sun Mei. The awkwardness had worn off a couple of months ago and they were back to being friends thankfully, but he couldn’t help feeling he cheated on Luo Binghe especially when her artificial waves pulled back into a bouncy ponytail and red lipstick as vibrant as always.

“Sun Mei, hi,” he greeted warmly. He felt Luo Binghe shuffle closer. She rang them up efficiently and the two of them chatted idly until another coworker strolled over to the registers with a mischevious grin. 

“You called out last night and have the nerve to show face today and buy half our stock?” He indicated the two large bags of clothes. 

“I wasn’t feeling good, dude,” he grunted. “I’m better today, tomorrow I’ll be here for opening.”

Luo Binghe had pulled himself closer to Shen Yuan, a possessive hand hovering over his waist. He could almost taste the vinegar rolling off his skin. He quickly finished up and bid them goodbye and took Luo Binghe back to the fitting room to remove the tags and put him in his nicer clothes. He tried not to think about the number of people who’d tried them on before and the factory smell that still lingered in the fabric but this was just for their last errand. He wore taper cut jeans, black sneakers, grey heather and black raglan shirt, and a soft, black hoodie that fit his larger frame much better. The green beanie still sat on his head and Shen Yuan retied his hair into a simple low ponytail with a spare hair tie. He was undeniably handsome in the clothes that were closer cut to his figure, his heart tumbling summersaults in his chest over the nicely stretched fabric over the swell of his muscular chest. 

They stepped out and headed to the market down the street, a different one from the one closer to his apartment where Luo Binghe was kicked out of. With Shen Yuan at his side and non-cosplay looking clothes, this will go much better. It was like taking a child to a supermarket, his sticky husband constantly wandered off and reappearing with a new item and tossing it into the cart. He decided to indulge him this time and tried not to look at the total as he blindly swiped his credit card again and promised to make a payment tonight to soften the blow when the bill came in. 

Luo Binghe was almost walking on air in his new sneakers, all the groceries in his hands and the fresh bag of clothes, Shen Yuan left with nothing to carry but the crippling debt he was throwing himself under. He tried reaching out to take a bag and Luo Binghe, completely misunderstanding his intention, switched all four bags from his left hand to the right with the other five and took Shen Yuan’s hand. Show off. 

---

Living idly like this, domesticity so different from his previous life as Shen Qingqiu made it feel like he was living in a fanfiction. It was so soft, his days passing easily with Luo Binghe at his side again. They decided that there was no rush to pull Shen Yuan away from his current life just yet and let him finish the semester at least before they figured out how to get back.

A part of Shen Yuan was itching to go back to what he’d considered home for the past twelve years. Another wished to live here again with Binghe freeloading in his apartment to cook and clean for him. Their rhythm didn’t change, except Luo Binghe wasn’t pulled away to deal with demon lord business constantly, only watching dramas on TV that he said is helping him learn about this world’s culture, but Shen Yuan kept telling him things don’t actually work that way. He was so enthralled with the TV Shen Yuan was scared he was going to start neglecting everything to glue himself to the screen, much like Shen Yuan did his second year of college when a particularly thrilling and long anime came into his life. 

He was a househusband to Shen Yuan, once or twice even coming on campus with him and hanging around outside his classes until he got out, but most often stuck at home and kept the house clean and meals hot for when Shen Yuan came back from work and school. 

It was interesting teaching Luo Binghe everything he could of the culture and technology and as convenient as Luo Binghe found a rice cooker to be he still had his complaints.

“There’s no spiritual energy. I can barely pull anything from myself and there’s nothing in the air to feed me more,” he said.

“We don’t need them,” Shen Yuan answered. “There’s no monsters, and immortality is nothing but a fantasy.”

---

Luo Binghe found his fake robes one day while deep cleaning. 

“They’re lovely,” he said, neatly folding the top layer. “A-Yuan should put them on more. You would look very beautiful.”

Shen Yuan never associated his original self with that adjective. Cute in a masculine, handsome according to his mother, but he was never handed compliments for his appearance. In fact, he was pretty plain looking, especially in comparison to Shen Qingqiu. 

He put them on with Luo Binghe’s help. His hair was too short for the delicate jade hairpin he’d bought to match it. In the mirror, it was jarring seeing his plain face with short hair and glasses atop the graceful body of an immortal cultivator. It was silly in comparison when Luo Binghe saddled up next to him in the mirror, passing him his nice fan and placing his hands on his waist. His demon mark was on display and hair tied up messily, broad chest trapped in a black v-neck. Shen Yuan snapped open the fan and covered his bland face and Luo Binghe’s own beautiful one leaned down and brushed a kiss to his flushed cheek.

---

The first time Luo Binghe was in Shen Yuan’s car he kept the music off as to not overwhelm him with how different everything was. Luo Binghe had sat with his eyes wide in the passenger seat, his head swiveling around to take in as much as he could. It took a couple of drives before Luo Binghe fully relaxed, questions he had were already aired (most left unanswered because he doesn’t know jack shit about how engines work). Now, after all the TV Luo Binghe has seen, one of the tricks he picked up was shamelessly rubbing his large hand over Shen Yuan’s thigh toward the prize, only to be slapped away each time with a sharp threat of “I’ll drive us off the freeway if you don’t cut that shit out.” 

—-

Speaking of sex, they haven’t done anything since Luo Binghe’s arrival. It’s been two weeks and on top of the year and a half apart, Shen Yuan was surprised Luo Binghe wasn’t more forward with what he wanted. 

Actually, he had been. On the third day he seemed to be vibrating with want, his hands lingering like hot brands on whatever bit of Shen Yuan he could grab, his eyes dark with hunger. 

“No.” Shen Yuan told him firmly. He’s thinking about how much it hurt in the peerless immortal Shen Qingqiu’s body. He’s already very fragile, very mortal body would suffer. He would die! Actually die this time! There was no System to do a magic reboot, nor a homegrown spare body hanging around! “We can ease into it but right now can we… can we just cuddle?”

Luo Binghe had pouted, but obliged, especially to an obviously shameless request from Shen Yuan. His face was much too thin to be asking for anything like that! It took all of him just to ask him to hold him!

He remembered a coworker, during a shameless conversation during recovery after store hours, talking about practice. Maybe… maybe he’ll look into it. Or alternatives for them. 

Thank the gods Luo Binghe doesn’t know how a computer worked, let alone be able to check his search history. 

---

He let slip he was debating on canceling his study abroad trip to his brother during a video chat and shortly later received an angry phone call from his mother about how he was throwing everything away for nothing. The worst was when his sister dropped by for a surprise visit. She brought lunch, his favorite take out place, but was taken aback by the sight of Luo Binghe relaxed across the small couch with an arm obviously out from where Shen Yuan had been cuddling into him.

His sister was polite and had thankfully bought a lot of food anyway to give Shen Yuan the leftovers for later meals. They ate crammed in his little living room with Luo Binghe on the floor pressed up against She Yuan’s legs. It would have been nice if it weren’t for her eyes shifting from Luo Binghe to Shen Yuan to the luggage tucked in the corner, the price tags still on. She didn’t say anything until she left and texted him aggressively about ditching his future for “a fling”. He chose to leave it on read and went to bed with his husband.

---

Finals nearly killed him. Thanks to Luo Binghe’s support, staying up with him every night and checking through his resources with him, quizzing him and feeding him, he pushed through the last week of school with a heaving gasp that left him collapsing face-first at the front door the moment he kicked off his shoes. Luo Binghe yelped and ran over, rolling him over to hold him in his arms.

“Shizun? A-Yuan?” Luo Binghe pleaded, tears gathering in his wide eyes. “Are you okay?”

“‘M fine. Just wanna sleep a bit.” He refused to open his eyes, snuggling a little deeper into Luo Binghe’s arms. “Let’s get drinks later to celebrate."

They ended up not getting drinks, but Luo Binghe made him the congee he missed so much and laid kisses all over him. 

---

His parents were aware that there was a “someone” that influenced his decision to stay in China despite all the work he put into getting accepted into the program in the first place. His plan was to finish this semester at least then go back to Proud Immortal Demon Way. He would like to stay longer and get his whole degree, as he only had a semester left, but he missed that shitty world so much the ache weighed heavy whenever Shen Yuan left to go to class or work. He’d sit in his little car and sigh. This second chance at being Shen Yuan had left him mourning for the life he fought so hard to have

He figured at first when Luo Binghe found him again he would be happy at least with him at his side, but a gnawing restlessness ate through his insides. He craved the badly written world of Proud Immortal Demon Way where he idled away as a Peak Lord and taught children how to better themselves. Luo Binghe didn’t say, and never will, but he wasn’t totally happy living in modern China even with Shen Yuan. Finals were over and with America becoming a fading dream it was time to start figuring it out.

—-

“We should get married again,” Luo Binghe suggested. “We’re married back home, but not here.”

“We could do a courthouse wedding, sure, but you don’t have any form of ID. I technically can’t marry a person that doesn’t exist,” Shen Yuan pointed out. 

“It could be for show, for your friends and family.”

Luo Binghe hadn’t even met his whole family yet and Shen Yuan didn’t know if he wanted him to. He already met his sister against his will, but his brothers and parents? He didn’t even want to play with the idea, let alone consider introducing them as his husband. Most people in China weren’t very, ah, agreeing to same-sex marriage as of yet and he didn’t want to test if his parents were part of the smaller percentage of those who were okay with it. 

“I’ll think about it.” Shen Yuan stopped when he saw Luo Binghe’s widen, tears brimming at the corners unshed. “I want to, it-it would be lovely, but let me figure out how we can make it work here, yeah?” 

The main issue was his family thinking he ditched America to get married to some unknown man when, well, that’s what he’s doing isn’t he?