#i don't plan on liveblogging

[forcebookish]

i'm rewatching dollhouse and it reminds me of bleach only in that it has some of the best twists i've ever seen in a series and some of the worst twists i've ever seen in a series

[kiwioala]

idk how many ppl watch clowns pov but i don’t think clown necessarily intends on Betraying foolish, he’s said several times that he has some sort of loyalty to the kingdom, he just wants to manipulate/control foolish and his reign a little bit from what i've heard ^_^ however owen is a different story he fucking hates that guy and wants him Dead.

[secriden]

WAIT.

What if Fadel goes on the run not, as I thought before, because the police are on to him/them.

But because he's trying to save Style from Bison????

Potential reasons why this could work:

Fadel seems way more conflicted about this than Bison in this scene

He's asking Bison what he, not they, are going to do. Although this could be a translation thing :'(

It explains why Style is with him but seemingly reluctant (at first) to be there.

Style not realising why Fadel is dragging him on the run/not fully understanding the danger he's in could explain the whole "handcuff to the bed" scene

It's Fadel that wants to stay and figure out if it is really Kant/Style. Bison was ready to vanish into the night.

Fadel has more reasons to forgive Style (Style didn’t know at first; Style has been dropping painfully obvious hints in context that he knew) and frankly a better disposition (less drastically emotional, more patient, more focused on finding solutions than dwelling on the problem) than Bison has to forgive Kant.

[mulders-too-large-shirt]

s6 episode 20 thoughts

i hope that this episode gives us plenty of mulder and scully time, despite the episode description only mentioning the lone gunmen. i love them, but i crave mulder and scully time. it’s part of what i need to thrive. 

but! a return of susanne modeski!! glad to know she is still out there, because it very much seemed like she got killed that last time we saw her.

post-episode notes: wait, this one was really good 🥹🥹 and maybe i asked for mulder and scully time and received absolutely none (beyond one side of a 30 second phone conversation, which WAS genuinely very funny), but it was still SO good. the lone gunmen are my friends. and so is scully. and she suffered deeply. but. she likes hickey and cutie and byers. my poor sweet baby that could kill me with ease!!!

let’s begin!!

previously, on the x files… 

girl, that whole thing with susanne was a while ago. don’t try to trick us into thinking the last episode wasn’t baseball msr!

okay. yes. my memory is jogged. she wanted to expose the plot about the evil chemicals. but she got shoved in a car, and we haven't seen her since. and that was 10 years ago.

BYERS IS NARRATING!!! oh. he is special To Me.

he dreams that JFK was never shot… and he has these little kids who hold his hands. in this dream, america hasn’t been betrayed by its government. and he has a dog. and he’s married to susanne!!! bro kissed her once and has been down bad since.

he says all his hopes are fulfilled in this dream- for his country and himself. which means bro wants two kids and a picket fence and a wife and golden retriever… and instead he has the homies… which isn’t so different, if you think about it… but aww… little teddy bear byers… 

he wanted to save her. but it seemed innocent. not like the sort of manipulative man who goes into things thinking he wants to save a woman, if that distinction makes sense. there’s a naivety about his whole approach. an innocence.

and they kiss in his dream. near the lemon trees. oh. they’re going in for more. damn. he wants her BAD.

but in the dream, he always loses it all. and ends up in a desert. 

NOT cool. we need to give byers some melatonin to ensure he has good sleep and hopefully some sweet dreams.

intro time… love that blurry shot of the agents bursting into a room with their guns…and the intro was very short this time!!!

okay. so now we’re in nevada, at an event for defense contractors. noted. i’m starting to think there will be no agents in this episode. sad.

some people are playing poker. byers is among them! he claims his name is stuart funsten. and he gets the other guys talking while they play. this guy is talking about new tech that allows for cooking people’s brains in their heads. oh! at least he’s enthusiastic about the whole thing. 

frohike is collecting the chips!!! he makes a remark about the dealer being a man of distinction. which probably means about the chip or the brand or something, but idk. i rarely know what frohike is talking about.

byers is still in- the last person left, alongside the dealer. he puts another 200 on it. and gets raised 1000! and byers raises it EVEN more!!! 

frohike clears his throat pointedly. and when the dealer comments on the company byers allegedly works for, langly is in his ear, researching the appropriate response!

aw. you know, maybe not having agent time isn’t such a bad thing. look at these nerds!! 

he starts talking trade secrets on the air conditioner on the planes he very much (/s) works for…. and the dealer raises the pot AGAIN. 

langly tells him to stall and to FOLD, but he does neither!!! byers is doing some improv!

he says they subcontracted the japanese and triple billed the government. same thing they always do.

NOOOOO. the other guy beats his hand, but just barely!!!! a king high flush to a queen high flush!

and dealer says to call security on stuart AND his partner!! he got busted!! he made up that word he asked about!!! which is why langly couldn’t find anything on it!!

they get manhandled out, which leads to frohike asking “hey man, you want to thunderdome?” <- and that is really funny.

langly is MAD that byers lost $3,000, but frohike says that it has to be him that goes undercover and not langly, “because this ain’t woodstock” (grabs his hair) <- LMAO

they didn’t even get any prints off the drink glasses!!! this convention was a BUST! byers says they should look into the dealer guy. 

a knock at the door. 

someone claims to be the CIA. they open up… it’s jimmy and timmy!! i don’t know who these guys are, but they must be friends- or enemies- of the gunmen, because one of them is wearing a shirt that says “government patsy”.

he asks if they were sneaking around… maybe they were… and maybe these two got something… well, maybe the gunmen did too!!

no, jimmy and timmy confess that they did not in fact, get anything. “it’s the t shirt” <- LMAO

t shirt guy says it means he is onto them!!! that he knows this year’s theme is assassination!! but he won’t say where he heard that theme. anyway, he claims there is some new stealth assassination tech being unveiled soon- and they will be front row. 

the gunmen tell them to go ahead to their lobster and “boobage”. which is diabolical.

OH! frohike says byers looks sad- he's the one that pushes the hardest for them to go to conventions, and then gets all squirrely when they arrive. “you’re still looking for her, aren’t you?” he asks.

byers says they met her at a convention! but frohike adds that they both know what happened. byers thinks that she was too important to the government to kill. frohike responds that either way, she is hopefully in a better place than las vegas, and grabs his shoulder, asking him to come along for lobster time.

oh… frohike knows him so well :(

they journey down to the slot machines… and as frohike says he feels lucky, byers SEES HER!! he goes to follow her. but it seems he’s lost where she went…. ah! he’s on her tail!!! 

he knocks a guy over trying to follow her. disaster.

AH!! A PHONE RINGS!!! AND IT WAKES UP SCULLY IN BED!!! SHE WAS SLEEPING! LET HER SLEEP!! DO NOT DISTURB HER SLUMBER!!

but i was thinking there would be NO scully today, so i am pleased :) even if she is not. 

it’s mulder, calling at 2:34 am. asking her to go to vegas RIGHT NOW!!! because the lone gunmen need her. 

LMAO, she says she trusts him, but she’s not so sure about the three stooges, BAHAHA

BUT THE GAG IS: IT ISN’T MULDER!!! it's the gunmen, using some sort of voice synthesizer!!! they literally predicted spongebob voice AI videos…

oh, mulder is going to call her tomorrow and ask where she is, and there is going to be a big mess, i can just tell already.

she sighs deeply. and says she will be there.

BAHAHAHAHA, frohike acknowledges that she will kick their asses. and it’s true. 

he trapped her cell, so if she tries to call mulder, it’ll go to them!!!!

frohike doesn’t even know why they need scully, LMAO, but byers says if they’re up against government agents, they need their OWN government agent. BAHAHA, does he want them to fight it out or something? 💀

but mulder is too high-profile! “he’s virtually a household name to the black-ops who kidnapped susanne in baltimore” <- so you want to bring in SOMEONE ELSE for the black ops to kidnap?! watch it, buddy… you may be a teddy bear, but don’t be stupid with scully…

langly asks byers if he is positively sure that he saw modeski. and he says he is- and they must find her.

he goes to get some ice, and sees the mystery dealer man who beat him in poker before!!! and he opens a hotel room door… and KISSES susanne!!! byers is heartbroken!!!

nooo!!! why’d you call scully here for this?!?

byers submerges his head in the ice, which prompts langly to say he thinks he’s trying to kill himself. “stop trying to kill yourself, byers” <-LMAO

oh, the poor boy is soaking wet and sad. but frohike found that the mystery poker man is named grant ellis, maybe from new mexico judging by the plates on the car. he’s from the D.O.D. and he works for the place susanne did!!!

byers comes to the conclusion that he MUST have brainwashed her. he thinks she ran from the people she used to work for, and there’s no way she would go back to work for them- or kiss that guy. it HAS to be brainwashing! 

frohike says he knows a way to find out. and he’s on the move… watching as the housekeeper enters susanne's room. 

meanwhile, byers is trying to get into the conference, but he can’t, because the guard who threw him out is working the door. langly wants to go instead, but byers again gestures to his hair. 

when they are stopped by their friends or enemies from earlier! with other friends or enemies! it seems they must be enemies of the extreme variety. jimmy says he can get in… when the time is right. he knows a hole in their security. 

but byers tells jimmy he needs to get in there today. so he had better prove he can do it

so jimmy crawls in through the vents… and listens from inside. and records with a camcorder!!! susanne is on the panel presenting!!! what is she doing?!

timmy is inside, too!!! it appears there is a traitor in the jimmy and timmy team!!! 

TIMMY IS ONE OF THE BAD GUYS!!!! he says jimmy really screwed things up!! they wanted to use him for assassinations… and they wanted him as a patsy. 

BLEH... they shoot something into his head. gross.

scully arrives!!! she's asking someone to please take her bag up to her room. and byers and langly are here. the first words out of her mouth: “where’s agent mulder? i’ve been trying to call him” <- BAHAHA okay, yeah. your priorities are abundantly clear!

langly stutters… uh, his phone is messed up, and he might be hard to reach!!

OH she is SUSPICIOUS, LMAOOO.

but they find jimmy!!! he jumped in front of a bus!!! or did he… was he framed?!?! bleugh, that is very bloody. 

no one is answering scully’s questions and she’s annoyed, BAHAHA.

frohike finally sneaks into susanne's hotel room….. he has some gadgets about. he finds a camera recording him!!! but then someone is at the door!!! it’s susanne!!

he hides in the bathroom… and she starts to get undressed. and gets in a robe instead. 

oh… she comes in the bathroom…. but there’s a knock at the door. it’s byers!!!

he straight up asks if he remembers her!!! 

“john, what are you doing here?” <- OH! so she does!!!

he tries to say that he is here to save her…. but she says she hasn’t been brainwashed. he says his friend was killed, and that man you are with… 

“you mean my fiancé?” <- OH! the plot thickens.

byers has had enough. did he not see her get kidnapped?! she says it did happen. but things got better. and then she shuts the door on him. which does not answer much.

how is frohike gonna get out… he climbed up the vents!!! bro is a spider monkey!! he waves around the camera he found.

scully is in autopsy mode!!! she makes sure that whoever she is with really wants to be here. and it is langly, who says he is cool. but he looks like he’s gonna die. and then she’ll have to autopsy him, too.

langly is trying very hard to keep it together, but is quite literally quivering as scully does her job.

oh. she snapped her mask on. and i started blushing. 

oh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

okay. yeah ❤️

she is cutting into the body. and we can see it go down in the reflection from her goggles. very gross! EWWWWWW.

EWWW, THE RIBS!!!

she asks him to please pass the saw on the counter, and also, i have been spelling his name wrong, or perhaps autocorrect has, because there is no e. just langly. so i must edit this in the notes. forgive me if a typo makes it through to the final product.

okay. she’s looking at some ribs. an average day in the office for her.

but he runs out to get sick. and drops the saw. it is a good thing this happened, though, because she sees the injection on the dead body's neck as she picks it up!!

BUT NO!!! timmy sneaks up on her and INJECTS HER!!!! I’LL KILL YOU WITH MY BARE HANDS, TIMMY!!!

langly runs back out, and she’s out cold on the ground!!!!

oh no…. as she comes back to, he proposes that perhaps the blood made her pass out. bro. she’s a pathologist. this is not the most likely scenario.

SHE CALLS HIM CUTIE. and mumbles “done, done, done”. “how do you roll this thing?” <- OH!!! baby is stoned out of her mind!!!! help her!!! get her someplace safe!!! do not let her near a bus, langly!!

I’M FUCKING CRYING…. “what killed him?” “my medical opinion? beeeeeeeeeeeeeep” (she claps her hands) “and that’s all you found?” “that’s all i know” <- BAHAHAHAHHAAAAAA 

she collapses again. but langly doesn’t have an eye on her!!! he just went back to his own room! he says she claimed there was something important she needed to do!!! “man, she is seriously jet-lagged” <- BRO, GO FIND HER AT ONCE!!

frohike plays the video from susanne’s room, where she says she feels like she is being watched. ellis says she worries too much- the plan is on schedule. and they’re cuddling. gross. 

byers insists it is not her. “she would not marry that man” “you don’t know him like i do” “how’d you get in here?” <- BAHAHA

susanne jumpscare!!! she says he saved her life and the lives of thousands of others. and she asks to talk to byers. alone. the other gunmen sliiiiiide out.

she wants to know about his friend being murdered. and she says she is always in danger. 

oh… she’s thought about this moment- reuniting with byers- so many times. all the things she would say. oh!!! well! that certainly has some implications!!

so the bad guys took her and did things to her, and it was like drowning. and ellis pulled her up. even though she wanted it to be byers who did that!!!

ellis worked for them… but she says he was working against them, sabotaging them. he reminded her of byers. OH! so she def loves him

back to slot town with frohike and langly. WHERE IS SCULLY??? i am stressed. frohike insists he could get all the money out of this place if he didn't have morals.

oh no… timmy approaches…. they don’t know he’s evil…! he asks them to come play dungeons and dragons in memory of jimmy. and langly agrees. 

but frohike hears something in the distance. it’s scully laughing!!! she’s acting wildly drunk. SHE CALLS HIM HICKEY!!! AND TELLS THE MAN WHISPERING IN HER EAR TO BE NICE TO HIM!!! SHE SAYS SHE LIKES HIM!!! AND PETS HIS FACE!!!

(she likes him......... oh.....)

OH, THE CIGARETTE SCENE. AND THE 800 LIGHTERS EMERGING AT ONCE. she cannot decide who lights her fire! i have seen this in gif form, and was always wondering what the context to that was. now i know. it makes sense that such a thing would only happen when she is... deeply inebriated. it's just not like her. poor thing.

he's trying to point out to her that she DOESN'T SMOKE. frohike tells everyone to back off!!! that is SPECIAL AGENT DANA SCULLY!! if you touch her, you may be committing a crime!!! go frohike!!!!

“we could’ve been stardust”, says some random guy. “maybe next time” (DID SHE SLAP HIS ASS?!) (or did he slap hers? because i might have to kill him, too)

langly is brought up to play d&d, which again, they are somehow playing for money- but he is surrounded!!!

susanne and byers are watching the tape frohike snatched from her room. he says he didn’t film them, which means “they” know. they were going to try and escape on the last day of the conference and go public with the research. the public is finally ready to believe. but they know everything, and they’ll kill them both. not great.

frohike walks in with a giggly scully, and susanne realizes what is going on at once. she was injected with a gas made by susanne!! ellis thought if they developed a small batch and destroyed the notes, they had the proof they needed to go public. and grant and her are the only ones with the samples…. 

grant evil confirmed?!

poor drunk/gassed scully is looking at them with great sadness as she realizes the weight of their words.

susanne is injecting her with something to counter the effect of the gas- once more, scully calls langly “cutie”- wait, langly made it out?!?! and after commenting on the pain, scully goes DOWN like a ton of bricks. 

“i don’t understand, why would the government want to turn scully into a bimbo?” <- I’M FUCKING CRYINGGGGGGGGGGHHGGHHGHGGGGGGG

BAHAHAHAHHAAAAAA, OKAY HOLD ON. HOLD ON. FROHIKE. 

holy fuck, that is so funny. filed under potential new blog titles. 

susanne says it’s a side effect- it can be used for brainwashing. such as making you forget your autopsy results. 

but what are they planning? frohike says they better find out fast. but langly scratches his wound from where he was injected!!!

langly returns to the room with timmy… where timmy says he is to go into the con the next day, and fire three shots at a target. 

we see langly going in there… with the gun…. will he do it??? susanne is at the panel. and ellis is next to her.

scully is back!! she is better!! i am so happy she made a quick recovery and managed to sleep it off! she wants to get in the room where the panel is happening, but she is not allowed.

ellis is watching as susanne leaves for the break…. and langly is approaching…. he pulls out the gun…… and he fires at her!!!! three times!!! and her blood splatters him in the face!!!! 

they call for a doctor!!! and scully is here to do just this. 

frohike and byers answer the call for help… WAIT, is this a plot…? they’re dressed as paramedics, and scully says to ellis that the shooter got away… oh, they’re in on this. it has to be fake blood. ellis asks who did this. girl... like you didn’t want this very outcome!!!

scully says to detain him!!!

frohike says “good work, party girl” and she makes a face like "why tf did he call me that" <- LMAO, ohhhh........

they load susanne onto the stretcher and take her away…. and timmy emerges… he realizes the blood is fake!!!

scully brings ellis in with frohike, where a perfectly fine susanne is standing!!! she asks for a moment alone with him. which seems dangerous, since he just tried to kill her.

ahaha!!! frohike has his poker chip!!! he says thanks for the tip!!

“big surprise, huh? since your programmed my friend to kill me?” “no, susanne, it wasn’t my idea” <- bro doesn’t even DENY IT?? just claims he isn't responsible?!?

omg… she has very specific spots under her shirt with fake blood containers… which makes that langly is a pretty good shot… very interesting to know!!

she asks why he saved her in the first place if he was just going to kill her. because the project was over. he pretended to love her. what did he get out it? 

he claims he got his life. 

but in walks timmy!!! with a gun!!! and he kills ELLIS!! and then he points it at her!!!!

no!!! timmy takes her at gunpoint to the gunmen's room!! and they let her in!!

(side note, frohike referred to susanne as “mata hari” twice now, and i didn’t know who that was, so i googled it… a very interesting rabbit hole WILL be followed later tonight)

TIMMY TRIES TO GET BYERS…. but byers gets him with the gas!!!!! 

lmao and he says “hi, cutie” too <- bahaha

timmy has confessed to the murders of grant ellis AND susanne!! no!! i was hoping she would make it!!!

scully is yelling on the phone, trying to reach mulder. she says she’s at the hotel. “what do you mean ‘what hotel’? las vegas” <- OH NOOO… 

“you called me… what do you mean, you didn’t call me?” <- BAHAHA

“oh, man… i am gonna kick their asses” <- YEAHHHHHH!!!!!!!

OH!! susanne isn’t really dead!!! byers hands her a paper containing information on her alias!! 

she asks him to come with her?! he thinks about it…. but he says she’ll be safer without him. “leave it to us now. it’s what we do”

she gives him something… and then another kiss…. and says “someday”. then gets in the car.

SHE GAVE HIM THE WEDDING RING MEANT FOR ELLIS?!?!?!

and they go to hit the slots.

the end.

wait, this episode was actually really good… i was going to write it off because i didn’t think there would be agent time… but it was actually quite precious….

oh, scully. i wanted to see her kick their asses. 

poor scully!!! but lord, was her comedic acting funny. BEEEEEEEEP. bahahahaha. i was lowkey worried when she had the scene surrounded by all those men, though. i was like oooooookay... where is this going to go? very grateful she was just flirty and not taken advantage of by creepy men. shoutout to frohike FR FR, he is a real one

“why would the government want to make scully a bimbo?” still has me HOWWWWWWWLING. 

aww! the gunmen… i love them……. they’re so silly…. they love each other...

scully agreeing to go track them down in vegas even thought it was the middle of the night… because it was mulder who asked... yeah <3 she trusts him so much... and she is selfless to a fault....

oh, i hope mulder took her somewhere nice after that. to compensate for the shenanigans they put her through. and the drugging. "BEEEEEEP. that’s all i know". OH. i've said it a million times, but that poor thing!

it was funny to see her so out of it, though. just because she is generally hypercompetent in all capacities. trying to imagine mulder seeing her like this... i wonder if her memories returned to her eventually, or if she will just be really confused forever as to why frohike called her "party girl"... imagine sharing that story with mulder over a glass of wine........

yes. i need the followup MSR date fic.

oh! byers will get his happy ending someday.

what an excellent little side journey. it was a silly one. and you know i love a silly one. not a whole lot of character exploration with our main characters, but a trip into side character land can be very well done.

i cannot believe i am nearing the end of s6! it's been like... 2-ish months since i started?? i think? time blurs together- it's hard to tell. so we still have a bunch of unanswered questions. such as: is spender still out there or is he dead for real? where is diana? and most importantly, is mulder going to tell us why he has been so cranky on and off again? is he all better now that he had a nice little baseball date? will he apologize for his actions? what is going on behind the scenes that he isn't telling us? is this little romp down side character avenue a hint to a future plot? they said that mulder was practically a household name to the blackops that took susanne- have they been messing with him, or something?

i need resolution to the angst! i need an apology video with tears!

i will forever cherish scully mumbling "done, done, done". ah. she has been through so much.

[wanderingandfound]

Dipping into a new fandom and like, the gay ship is 100% more fleshed out and nuanced in the source material. Unfortunately for me the m/f ship has the dynamics I personally find more compelling.

Anyways the interesting thing is that just from a week of browsing fic I have found that the quality on the whole of the m/f fics to be subpar and mediocre. But the f/f ones are standard on average, with a better chance of being excellent.

Anyways I'm not mad I've spent two weekends reading fic. I'm a little irritated at myself that I haven't liked most of the fic though. It's been kinda like eating junk snacks in the sense that the good stuff leaves me wanting more, while the so-so stuff has me seeking out satisfaction elsewhere instead of doing the healthy thing and putting the snacks down and searching out a meal (a novel from one of the stacks I need to return to the library).

But after reading soooooo many mediocre words treading the same story, I did find today a fic that's really poorly written but is telling a new story. It's been nearly a decade since I've followed a fic being like "Oh I think a 14 year old is writing this, I can't wait to see where it goes." Interestingly both this fic and that other one stars a teenage girl OC. In this fandom it stands in stark contrast to a canon teenage girl that nobody in the fandom seems capable of writing with depth.

Anyways, I am constantly craving post-canon material and am unfortunately reading a bunch of canon-from-different-PoV works instead.

[psychopomp-namine]

just found out about the "faking death" coded message.

lmao. no way right. I was just joking in the tags of that traffic light theory post.........

[turnaboutstar]

what is she planning?? I saw something about her like holding people hostage before playing this game but probably will happen later in the case...

[horatiocomehome]

ISAT is perfect for fandom activities, like it's got worldbuilding! It's got angst! It's got awesome characters and found family and banter! It's got ANGST! It has TIMELOOP! Did I mention the ANGST!

[spaceparanoidsz]

(2020 // 2024)

(Kinda) redraw of my old Xara and Stella fanart

[hesgomorrah]

bonanza (1959-73)

[lunanoc]

so probably against what should have been my better judgment, i went ahead and actually wrote “meta”, except it’s only borderline meta because it ends up veering off into crack theory territory and is also insanely long, but i figure since it’s now too long to be posted as a discord liveblog like it was supposed to be, i might as well just. post it here (in several parts because no one wants a 10k post lbr)

disclaimer: i like to be transparent about where i’m coming from, so just know that i have not finished reading all the books yet. currently i’m practically through everything, books and extras included, up until and including sand sea part III, so anything i talk about relating to that is my own reading experience. i’ll sometimes reference later books i’ve either read snippets of, or talked about with people who have (and verified the information as best as i could), but because i lack full context for those, any mentions of those elements are automatically grain of salt and relegated to crack theory. for everything i have read that i can grab quotes for, i’ll be providing clear references to the specific chapters of the books they’re from

also, blanket spoiler warning for the books

but that being said, let me actually get into this thing:

king shang of lu, the iron-masked gentleman, king mu of zhou, the queen mother of the west, how they’re connected, who they might be, and what that could mean for the larger dmbj narrative

PART I: KING SHANG OF LU AND THE IRON-MASKED GENTLEMAN

writing this shaved years off of me, the rabbit-holing was insane, and there’s still no clear answers in the end but welcome to the ride i guess

starting off here, the problem with these two characters is that we have conflicting information about them from three different sources that all give a different version of the same story, all of which are various degrees of dubious for different reasons. and you could say ok but really, who cares i do apparently about these two because in the larger plot they don’t really amount to much in the end

BUT

given both the things we learn by the end of sand sea (and elements that pop up in later installments) about all the various parties involved in what’s essentially a subplot, and the fact npss goes into so much detail with such a deliberate throwback to something all the way back in the first book, i don’t think the fact that the various versions of the story of king shang of lu sometimes blatantly contradicting themselves is a mistake, but is rather proof of deliberate obfuscation of the truth. npss tends to like revisiting sometimes seemingly anecdotal or trivial things from previous books to connect them with a subsequent revelation, or open the door to a different interpretation of them, so that he’d do it here isn’t all that surprising to me

the three versions of the story of “the emperor” (or the ruler of the state of lu), king shang of lu, and the iron-masked gentleman we get are, in order of appearance:

version 1 from a silkbook found in the purple jade box in “king shang of lu”’s coffin (Book 1, Ch. 26, Purple Jade Box)

version 2 from xiaoge himself who gives an opposing account to the previous one that he supposedly read from a warring states period silkbook he found in a song dynasty tomb (Book 1, Ch. 26-27, Purple Jade Box / Lies)

version 3 from the powerpoint lesson given by the wang family to li cu (Sand Sea Part III, Ch. 132, 133, 134, Lesson / King Mu of Zhou / Deception)

the first two accounts are both from book 1 and immediately follow each other, but neither of them quite fit with the last one, or at least it would seem so. you could argue this is simply because book 1 was when npss was still trying to figure things out both with his plot and characters, so the final account given by the wang family is a retcon, and while that’s always possible, like i mentioned, npss likes to connect things and tends to either incorporate these kinds of seemingly obscure and irrelevant details for a reason, or simply retroactively fleshes them out to revisit them at a later date and shed a new light on the bigger picture. so it’s more the fact we just don’t know which things he implements deliberately from the start and which ones he ties back to retroactively, but in the end seeing as the result is the same it doesn’t matter much. what does matter is that he does it pretty consistently, so it’s safe to assume he’s also doing it with this particular story (side tangent, but i like to think that npss has shown he’s a big fan of something called chekov’s gun and no i won’t elaborate on that or else i’ll be here for hours but google that if you’re interested it’s fun)

so tldr; i basically just want to argue that by intentionally bringing back this story with obvious divergences, it might be a way to shed light on something else that informs king shang of lu’s story while placing it as a puzzle piece in the bigger picture of dmbj lore

but let’s break down those three different accounts of the story of king shang of lu

the first account

i’m going to tldr; most of these for the sake of clarity, but i’ll be referencing the various chapters all these bits are taken from if you want to verify any of it

technically the first real account of king shang of lu’s story we get is what’s written on the stone slab in the hall with all of the coffins in the seven star palace that says that he was “born with a ghost seal and could borrow ghost soldiers from the underworld” (Book 1, Ch. 10, Shadow), but i’m not counting that as a full-blown version of the story because it’s not dwelt on all that much and mostly serves as a preamble for pangzi to later posit to wu xie that it’s a bunch of bs and was probably just an exaggeration meant to mythologize king shang of lu given that the tomb itself is a weird anachronistic mix of western zhou and warring states architecture (which is an important argument but maybe not for the reasons you’d think)

so i consider the first fleshed-out version of king shang of lu’s story we get to be the one wu xie reads off of the silkbook he and wu sanxing pull from “king shang of lu”’s coffin, and is one that very quickly gets debunked within book 1 itself multiple times, so while it may seem easy enough to write off, it’s not so much what it says that’s interesting, but rather why it exists in the first place

this version of the story essentially relates the life and deeds of king shang of lu, recorded on what’s supposed to be a warring states period silkbook pulled from the man’s own coffin. it talks about how he inherited his title from his father and was a lowly grave robber lord who was cruel and greedy, and how one day he gained from a snake demon/spirit in a tomb he excavated “two treasures” in a “purple and gold box” (this will be important later) which are never explicitated, although wu xie speculates one of those treasures to be the ghost seal as its acquisition is directly mentioned in the text. the snake comes to king shang of lu in a dream and promises to make him a high-ranking official and teach him how to use the treasures in the box if he spares its soul (he doesn’t). and so king shang of lu becomes a military officer under the command of the “emperor” of the state of lu. in his later years, however, he starts to get old and sick, and so the “emperor” demotes him back into being a lowly grave robber, and he starts to fear death, so king shang of lu goes to his military advisor, the “iron-masked gentleman” or 铁面先生 tiemian xiansheng, in search of a solution. the iron-masked gentleman then tells him that something called jade burial armor, a treasure from ancient times, exists, and that it can keep someone young forever. so king shang hunts and hunts and scours tomb after tomb until eventually he finds a western zhou dynasty tomb which will later become the seven star palace where he discovers a corpse wearing the famed jade buriam armor. iron mask takes the corpse out of the armor, subdues the blood zombie it turns into, and then helps king shang of lu fake his death in front of the “emperor” so he can be buried in the tomb he built for himself on top of the western zhou tomb he’d found (Book 1, Ch. 26, Purple Jade Box)

however

this version is quickly debunked twice in pretty quick succession, and then a third time a bit later, still in book 1, but before i get to that, a few extra little details i want to point out:

to be fair literally no one (who doesn’t speak chinese and is reading the original text anyway) would be able to guess either from the translation or merebear’s footnotes that “iron-masked scholar/gentleman” or 铁面先生 is not in fact necessarily meant to be taken literally. it’s partly an idiom. 铁面 tiemian is an expression that can mean “someone who is upright in character”, in other words someone with a positive reputation. so this man isn’t necessarily implied to have worn a mask at all (i think he did, but that’s also for later)

the purple and gold box that’s mentioned in this version of the story is the one wu xie finds in the hands of the corpse of the green-eyed fox (who’s also wearing the belt that has the qilin blood clot wu xie accidentally swallows can you believe, which is also another detail for later) that’s accompanied by a key in the corpse of a woman next to it (Book 1, Ch. 22, The Eightfold Treasure Box)

the second account

before we get into the first version of the story more, let’s briefly take a look at the second one. the first version of the story is first debunked by the second version of the story which is told in abridged format by xiaoge pretty much right after wu xie finishes reading the silkbook. he says that the silkbook’s account is incorrect because the person in the jade armor isn’t king shang of lu, but iron mask who faked his own death in order to escape the systematic execution king shang of lu enacted on all the people who knew about and/or helped build his tomb. he then snuck into the seven star palace and disposed of king shang of lu’s body before taking the jade armor for himself

xiaoge explains that he found this story in a song dynasty tomb he’d robbed a few years ago that contained a complete silkbook that turned out to be iron-masked gentleman’s memoirs (Book 1, Ch. 27, Lies). and you’d be inclined to believe this version of the story over the first one because it’s xiaoge telling it, and xiaoge usually isn’t one for intentional deception unless it serves a purpose, even less so if it’s verbal deception (literally the only time i can think of him openly lying rather than lying by omission is when he disguises himself as professor zhang). except even this version is called into question multiple times. the first time is by wu xie himself, who while choosing not to confront xiaoge about it, senses that xiaoge seems uneasy when wu xie presses him on the point that if it’s true that two people were pulled out of the jade armor in that tomb, then why is there no second blood corpse. xiaoge answers that he doesn’t know because iron masks’s memoirs only mention it briefly, and that maybe king shang of lu was pulled out early enough that he didn’t turn into a blood zombie. technically there’s the mummified body they find in the sacrificial ding cauldron next to the coffin with the monster at the entrance to the seven star palace whose head is cut off that could fit that description (Book 1, Ch. 9, Ancient Tomb), but in any case xiaoge according to wu xie looks like he’s lying. the second time this version is refuted is by wu sanxing, but i’ll get to that when i get back to the first account and how it also gets debunked

arguments against the second account 

i already mentioned xiaoge isn’t typically someone who’s into overt deception as a course of action unless it’s strictly necessary (and even then). it’s always possible he was either acting on a compulsion from the heavenly gift or under some order from chen pi ah si (since he was working for him at the time, even if i doubt this to be completely honest) or even something else, so it’s mostly my own assumption that he’s not actively deceiving them by fabricating a story, because xiaoge’s deception usually relies on omission rather than a concentrated effort at producing an elaborate lie. so really, the only fact we can be certain of is that he has an “uneasy look in his eyes” when he talks about the lack of another blood corpse, and that wu xie gets the impression he’s lying, which is a sentiment wu sanxing apparently shares because they look at each other in that moment and silently agree. whether this means xiaoge was *actually* lying, or that wu sanxing was taking advantage of xiaoge’s unease to further his own deception (re: arguments against the first account i’m getting to in a bit) is really up in the air

however

i’d like to think if xiaoge was lying and there was nothing more to it than that, he wouldn’t make it so apparent that that was the case given he only ever really projects visible upset or discomfort at anything when it’s related to his memories or lack thereof, and only much later in the story does that start to extend to allowing himself moments of vulnerability, or just his own brand of open concern for wu xie and pangzi. but this is all happening in book 1 where wu xie, as perceptive as he is about people, doesn’t know xiaoge yet, and so doesn’t know his tells. therefore that he can tell xiaoge is visibly emoting when it’s xiaoge is noteworthy in itself. also, given that book 1 takes place at a time when xiaoge’s memory was still very much lacking and fragmented, and he was likely still working for chen pi ah si partly to search for his memories, i wouldn’t be surprised if his unease was visible because the confrontation of both the first and second versions of the story started triggering his memory in some capacity, or it might have even triggered the heavenly gift senses into letting him know that there was something of importance in these stories since the particular episode of it he’s going through at the time gets a bit fast-forwarded from the seven star palace onward seeing as not too long afterwards xiaoge goes into the gate at the end of book 3

something else that’s worth mentioning is the logic behind these memoirs of iron mask even existing. why it would be in a song dynasty tomb is up for debate and probably irrelevant (although it does to be fair align with king mu’s motives of perpetuating grave robbing for deliberate dissemination of information), but mostly i question how he could have written his memoirs if he faked his death and slipped into the jade armor himself shortly after, unless he waited a significant amount of time before doing so and lived his life in hiding, which is also possible given there’s nothing more we know about him. but more food for thought

arguments against the first account

let’s go back to the first account from the silkbook for a bit and take a look at the other two times besides xiaoge’s second account where this version is debunked:

the second debunking comes from wu sanxing as he and wu xie are waiting around in jinan while panzi is in the hospital, and wu sanxing comes back outraged bc when he tried to have the silkbook they brought back from “king shang of lu”’s coffin, he was apparently told it was a forgery because the gold in it was too pure to have dated back to the warring states period, and so was necessarily more recent, though how recent is never specified (Book 1, Ch. 29, Purple-and-Gold Box). he then suggests to wu xie that he thinks it’s xiaoge who snuck into the tomb ahead of them, and with his skills successfully planted a dupe to trick them. i’ll get back to this eventually, but again, while it’s not impossible, it feels unlikely to me that xiaoge would extend so much effort in deception unless it served a clear purpose he agreed with, which is why i’m not convinced he would have blindly been following orders from someone like chen pi ah ai. and xiaoge would likely not have gone to the trouble of making a fake silkbook either, so the idea would have to have come from chen pi ah si, which then brings into question what motive chen pi ah si would have had to go to such lengths to deceive wu sanxing. again, really the only time we ever see or hear of xiaoge making an effort at deliberate deception is when he disguises himself as professor zhang, and while we never get an explanation for the reasons behind that, that’s more likely to have stemmed from feeling like he had to conceal his identity rather than wanting to deceive if that makes sense. in any case, i don’t know what tangible reason xiaoge would have had to deceive wu sanxing and his team with a fake silkbook even if he’d been acting on chen pi ah si’s orders, because would chen pi ah si have had a reason to go to the effort of creating a fake silkbook to deceive wu sanxing with details so specific that you quite literally have to have been in that tomb before to know them?  

the third debunking of the silkbook version is ironically a reverse uno from xiaoge directed at wu sanxing when he, wu xie, and pangzi are stuck in wang zanghai’s tomb in xisha (Book 1, Ch. 63, Chain). xiaoge’s just recovered a massive amount of his memories related to the first xisha expedition, and very bluntly tells wu xie that not only is the silkbook from the seven star palace a fake, it was wu sanxing who planted it there. to which wu xie obviously responds with “wtf no you did”. to which xiaoge then replies completely deadpan as he does with “no, it was your sanshu, he and da kui dug a hole under the tree to do it, probably why da kui had to be silenced”. which leaves wu xie very torn about what and who to believe. and mind you this is also a little before they find the inscription on the wall from “xie lianhuan” accusing wu sanxing of murdering him. honestly it’s possible xiaoge is telling the truth if you consider that wu sanxing might have planted a fake if he knew ahead of time what the silkbook contained, what the seven star palace was, and basically faked his own way through the entire thing

it wouldn’t necessarily surprise me because he does sound very pretends to be shocked in the delivery of many of his remarks (but again, how much of that can you attribute to this being book 1), and while he did bring wu xie along because he was trying to ease him into the game with the wangs, it’s possible he was prudent enough that he would have made wu xie’s first tomb experience take place in a somewhat controlled environment. which doesn’t mean he’d necessarily been there before, just that as entrenched in the wang shit as he is, i wouldn’t be surprised if he’d known even vaguely what the seven star palace represented and what could be found in there. he did know about the snake cypress and about the stone used to subdue it, and while that doesn’t necessarily mean anything seeing as wu sanxing is a highly experienced tomb robber, it’s worth noting that the only times we’ve ever seen those trees is in the seven star palace and in the snake mine in gutongjing. in other words, always somewhere connected to longevity and The Secret and all the parties involved in that power struggle

but then again, we don’t really know how much wu sanxing knew about the wangs and the zhangs etc, so it’s all very up to interpretation. if he did in fact plant the fake silkbook though, it might have served the purpose of making sure there was something to string wu xie along to push him towards xisha and the conspiracy, but the copper fish ended up serving that purpose in the end. nothing really elaborates on this silkbook again, so we don’t know why xiaoge would speculate that wu sanxing was the perpetrator, unless it was because he’d just recovered his memories of xisha (but even then xiaoge doesn’t accuse people so firmly based on impression alone) or he literally saw wu sanxing do it

regardless of who did it, the bottom line is that it’s safe to say the silkbook was probably fake and was placed there intentionally, both because as wu sanxing points out, it is suspicious that wu xie would conveniently only be able to understand what happened to be key portions of the silkbook relating parts of king shang of lu’s life, and because it mentions the purple and gold box in it, which when opened, wu xie discovers contains the first snake-eyebrowed copper fish

to me this actually pushes suspicion more heavily onto two parties in particular: wu sanxing and the wang family. because to be able to forge a silkbook that would specifically contain passages tailored to wu xie’s knowledge of old chinese and not run the risk of him either knowing more or less than speculated, you would have to have extensive knowledge on wu xie as a person on a personal level. and to be fair, this idea hinges a lot on the silkbook being put into that coffin for wu xie specifically ti find, so i’m working on assumptions again, but if this were the case, then only wu sanxing and the wangs qualify to fill that role, and in some ways the wangs even more so because this kind of covert manipulation is very much the way they do things. xiaoge would not have known wu xie to that extent in book 1, if at all, and while wang zanghai himself is a tempting possibility, he was obviously in the seven star palace long before any of this took place, so it can’t be him. in fact, the only thing that ties wang zanghai to any of this at all is the purple and gold box containing the copper fish, since whether or not the box had originally been there and he simply emptied it of its contents or brought it in from outside, he’s the one who placed the copper fish in it

as to why if it was wu sanxing who planted the fake silkbook he would shift the blame onto xiaoge, my theory on that would be that xiaoge was another convenient means of stringing wu xie along into the xisha expedition mystery by virtue of him being zhang qiling and therefore both highly mysterious and suspicious, as well as personally involved. part of me wonders if part of the reason wu sanxing went to chen pi ah si to hire xiaoge specifically because he was added insurance that he would have the means to trigger wu xie’s curiosity, and provide a first clue to lead him into the It conspiracy. wu sanxing did use the picture of the expedition team to explicitly tie xiaoge into it along with the copper fish story, so there’s that to consider

the third account

which finally brings me to the final version of the king shang of lu story, which is the one given to li cu during the wang family powerpoint lesson. this particular version also overlaps with the story of king mu of zhou and the queen mother of the west, but i’ll get to in another part of this meta. so this version of the story is mostly ironically both the version that most blatantly contradicts the first two, while also being the version most accurate to the tiny introduction we get to king shang of lu at the entrance of the seven star palace that says he was “born with a ghost seal and could borrow ghost soldiers from the underworld”. the only real issue with that this third version has it’s told by the wang family to li cu, so just by virtue of it coming from obvious wang propaganda, it’s immediately suspicious by nature

going back to speculations about who planted the fake silkbook version of king shang of lu’s story in the seven star palace, it then also raises the question of, if the wangs were the ones who did it, what motive they would have had not only to do so, but to tell the story in that particular way, only to then tell a completely different one to someone they consider a candidate to join them. in my opinion, the only thing that makes this third version hold water is that given how it’s explained to li cu, and how wang xiaoyuan (the girl who passes by the window during the lesson) has the same version of it, the wang family believes this version is true, and by virtue of that, it gains a little more credibility, bc suspicious as they are and twisted by their own biases their version of history may be, the wang family is nonetheless well-informed for the most part. not to mention because the narrative has the wang family consistently mirror the zhang family and the way they function so perfectly it’s almost eerie, it stands to reason that the wang family also dabble in historical revisionism when they can, so putting out a fake version of history onto a fabricated silkbook seems up their alley

i’ll get into king mu of zhou separately because that’s a whole other can of worms, but this final version of king shang of lu’s story begins between the “emperor” of the state of lu and his advisor, the owner of a fox mask “with ancient patterns that often appeared on bronze ware” (Sand Sea Part III, Ch. 132, Lesson). the “emperor” asks his advisor “around 1000 BC” (fyi the original says 一千年上下 which amounts to “around 1000 years” but it’s more of an approximation and can technically encompass the warring states period too) as a hypothetical whether or not it’s possible “to prevent people from dying”, to which the advisor answers that he himself doesn’t know how, but he does know where to find something that can “beneath the loess inside the mountains”. he then goes on to tell the tale of king mu of zhou to the “emperor”, and of how he was given an elixir of immortality by the queen mother of the west that he likely hid inside of his tomb centuries ago

it very quickly becomes apparent to the reader that this story is an obvious ploy by the owner of the fox mask, who in sensing that the “emperor”, while tempted, is reluctant to cast all appearance of morality aside to deploy his troops to rob king mu of zhou’s grave, calls a “strange man” to the court who’s “believed to be a descendent of the zhou emperor” (that is to say king mu of zhou) “who was able to communicate with the underworld”. the ruler of the state of lu thus gives this “strange man” a jade seal and seals him in an iron coffin deep in a well for 49 days, saying that if he can come back up from it with the ghost seal in hand after having successfully spoken to king mu of zhou, then it would be proof of king mu granting him permission to rob his tomb and take the immortality elixir from it. and so this “strange man” does, in fact, come back, not only with the ghost seal in hand, but with an imperial edict written by king mu of zhou himself that granted him the title of king shang (殇 shang meaning to die young or at war) as well as all the contents of his tomb

the ruler of the state of lu then uses this to make several leaps in logic to justify being in the right if he deploys his troops to rob king mu of zhou’s tomb, because if this “strange man” can communicate with the underworld and was given a title relating to dead people, then surely that means that this strange “king shang” is likely dead himself, and that king mu of zhou chose him as his heir after he’d died. it’s a very convenient out for the ruler of the state of lu to say that he’s only helping an esteemed deceased elder to recover his birthright if he makes him a general and lends him troops to go find king mu of zhou’s tomb (Sand Sea Part III, Ch. 133, King Mu of Zhou)

it’s also quickly obvious to the reader that the owner of the fox mask and this newly minted king shang of lu are in fact working together, given it was the former who referred the latter to the state of lu’s court in the first place, which is something i’ll come back to in another part of this meta. from here, under the ruler of the state of lu’s orders, king shang and the owner of the fox mask, together with more grave robbers who also wore fox masks (as according to the wang family, foxes would live in graveyards and grave robber’s tunnels at the time, and so grave robbers associated their imagery with the profession), began their search for king mu of zhou’s tomb and the immortality elixir it supposedly contained. while this version of the story of king shang of lu more or less ends here, you could assume the rest of it might follow along the same lines of the first two versions, and maybe it does. you’d then assume that the person king shang and the owner of the fox mask (who’s by then inferred to be iron mask from the previous two versions) find in the western zhou tomb is king mu of zhou, who they then divest of the jade burial armor to take for themselves

however, one very important detail in this version compromises this assumption: king mu of zhou isn’t actually dead, and he thus gave king shang the edict personally (Sand Sea Part III, Ch. 134, Deception). what this means is that the ruler of the state of lu was duped presumably not by two, but three people, all of whom were working together to find the jade burial armor for who appears to be king mu of zhou. in other words, where the other two versions of the story have two key players, this final version suddenly introduces a third one, and that changes things. how much it does is what i’ll be getting into in the next part on king mu of zhou more specifically

(tbc in part II and part III of this madness)

[blueskittlesart]

trying to avoid totk spoilers like the plague. i WILL go into this game blind

me refusing to watch those mediocre youtube men who got the game 2 weeks early

[crimeronan]

"if you were the last vampire on earth it would be enough" okay. Okay.

[laurelwinchester]

went into the dean winchester tag for the first time in months and in general it seems just as terrible and unhealthy in there as always. except... is it just me or are the new w*ncest stans even weirder than the old w*ncest stans?

[altschmerzes]

i need to do some whumptober planning [thinking emoji] the thing is that even if i never actually write any of them out completely, just planning fics out for the prompts is like. good for my creative brain and also extremely fun lmaooo.

[psychopomp-namine]

thinking out loud for fic writing purposes. this is not about canon. or maybe it is? idk. but this is mainly for fic, so I'm more hand-waivy with the canonicity of details.

so how does diving and the 12 hour rule work? if lu guang stays past 12 hours, he permanently lives in that body and can't dive anymore. that's the current assumption, right?

okay so now. hypothetically, let's say there are three timelines: A, B, C. let's say lu guang dives from timeline A -> B then from B -> C. let's assume that he hops between parallel/multiple timelines and doesn't loop within the same timeline.

can I safely assume that as long as the 12h isn't up, he's free to hop in any timeline within those 12h, without requiring a death transfer of abilities? e.g. is it possible to dive within a dive? recursive diving? diveception?

if you dive into someone's body, do you have access to their ability? I think cheng xiaoshi technically "experienced" the twins' abilities but didn't know what was going on at the time, and didn't "use" it himself. if you know how to use the ability though, could you use it for yourself? so for example, if lu guang, who knows how to dive because of the death transfer and has dived before, possessed cheng xiaoshi, could he use cheng xiaoshi's dive abilities and dive as cheng xiaoshi? my head is spinning just thinking this

let's say lu guang goes from B -> C. 12h pass so he's stuck there, but cheng xiaoshi dies and transfers the ability so lu guang can dive again. if he goes to the first 12h of his dive in timeline B, and then tries to "exit" the dive by clapping out, which timeline would he end up in? A or C? that is, I guess the question is which "version" of him does the dive ability respond to...? his body in timeline B, which was diving from timeline A? or the lu guang who's diving from timeline C? when you dive, your body disappears, so...

when lu guang hops between timelines, does he erase ("overwrite") the lu guang that's local to the timeline he hops into after 12h? does the lu guang of that timeline "die" or does he "merge" with the lu guang of the other timeline? is there a meaningful difference? the only difference would be in memories, I suppose, but memories shape identity...

the last two aren't really questions, but just some concepts I've been thinking about. again, this is for fic purposes, so this isn't any statement about canon or anything.

the concept of photographs as a snapshot of spacetime. but in particular, if parallel timelines exist (which liu xiao believes to be true), then are photographs considered like connecting points between timelines? if you in timeline A took a picture of the sunset while you're in the basketball court during university, and the you in timeline B did the same during highschool, and the circumstances between those two nodes are similar (same people are in the court, same time and place). would those two pictures act like portals to each other's timelines?

the purpose of the high five as an anchor to the current timeline, so the diver can enter and exit within their home timeline instead of hopping in parallel ones. this is not necessarily true in canon, as we see cheng xiaoshi clap himself into surveillance footage all the time and not worry about parallel timelines. but again, this is for fic, so it's (hand waves) whatever. or maybe... the camera itself serves as an anchor? hmmmmm