#im saying this platonically

[lightsupluvr]

“and if i didn’t know better….”

“i’d think you were still around.”

[stiffyck]

Good luck during pride month to all the aroaces who are gonna be blasted with "love is love" everywhere

Edit:

This post includes aplatonic people, loveless aros and any other people who fall anywhere on the aro and ace spectrum.

Stop saying "but theres platonic love and familial love-"

[just-a-small-menace]

Charles Rowland comparing him and his "platonic best friend" to Orpheus and Eurydice 0.002 seconds before saying he's not in love with him is truly just the most out of pocket moment

Like sir what kind of denial are you on and can i have some

[noornight]

Long distance besties. This definitely happened after the third movie (source: trust me bro)

Based on this

[daranatsus]

How about Mirabelle and Siffrin reading together?

Sleepy late night monster novel talk

[rapidhighway]

[findafight]

Robin and Steve playing a dnd character together because Steve said the only way he'd play is literally with Robin. They take turns each session for who speaks but always planning together. It's a teenage human, gangly and uncoordinated and a bit of a loner. Everyone sort of lets the "two people playing one character" issue slide, as they want to play a game with their friends.

Robin and Steve have wildly different character voices, and sometimes announce which way they are walking before stumbling in that direction, and also mutter to themself in character. when it's Steve's sessions to talk he flits with the NPCs Eddie plays, but Robin is just a little aggressive to them. The personality changes are kinda weird but everyone is just happy they're playing.

Everything is going well until the big bad of the short campaign they're all playing knocks them into a wall. Not hard, but hard enough they're scrambling and flailing and...splitting in half. By their own description. Immediately they start, with their respective character voices (they are committing to this bit) bickering about whose fault it is. And about what they should do now their cover is blown.

The table is silent.

Robin and Steve have been conning everyone the entire time. They're playing twin halflings, who alternated who sat on each other's shoulders pretending to be a human because they were goofing off the day they joined the party and were too embarrassed by the mix up to correct anyone about it until they had to. Their voices and personality changes are brilliantly embedded as not Robin and Steve not being able to keep consistent, it's because they've been playing different characters. It's brilliant. It's horrible. Everyone fell for it and the reveal essentially pauses play because everyone starts yelling at them.

[evermorepeyton]

i want so badly to come across one of these comments because this doesn’t feel real, i don’t go much on tiktok but is this……. real?

[altschmerzes]

if the only time you bring up A Secret Third Thing is when someone has suggested generally celebrating or uplifting platonic/queerplatonic fictional relationships in spaces that ordinarily obsess about romantic ones to the exclusion of all else perhaps consider why you’re doing that and also stop.

[thedemises]

——— A BITE OF LOVE。 ★ jiaoqiu.

note; og idea — the idea of feeding your partner food & kissing them over the pots is so beautiful n intimate I wanna cry /j

“say, ‘aaah’ ,” a spoon was brought over to where your lips are, a red liquid emitting a spicy yet delicious scent into the air enters your nostrils. even while you're reading, jiaoqiu always has an excuse to make you his taste testee for his new dish.

“mhmm,”

your eyes still remain focused on your own business as you obediently open your lips for him to push the spoon into your mouth, the splash of hot flavor hits your tongue as you savour the tasty soup your partner had provided you to taste — of course, he made sure to blow on the spoon for you beforehand.

although it tasted as it was you expected from his excellent culinary skills, despite being a healer (“using food to treat my patients is my specialty, y'know,” is what you recall him saying a while ago), something was off; a missing element perhaps.

“well?” his large, furry tail sways behind him while jiaoqiu anticipated for your awaiting response, eyes shut with a smile and scheme in his heart, he knows how honest you can be with your feedback — which is why he deems you best when it comes to tasting his spices and whatnot, or anything in general; if you will.

even though your eyes were trained on something else at the moment, you still paused to make the effort to share your thoughts on jiaoqiu's soup.

“it just needs a pinch of salt, but it still tastes as exceptional as you are.” you remarked just as you slowly turned a page, your eyes flickering from the book to settle on jiaoqiu, unintentionally giving him a chance to lean in and press a chaste kiss on the lips.

it felt like a second too long but he pulled away just as quickly as it came, chuckling a bit at your taken aback expression.

“thank you,” and just like that, jiaoqiu swiftly leaves your area with a satisfactory look on his face. his tail swaying behind him while he makes his exit out of the room.

you stare dumbfounded from where he just left; the flavoring of pepper, paprika, chili powder, and other constituents still lingers on your tongue like an unforgettable, pungent aroma.

subsequently that same day, jiaoqiu had called you over to help him prepare rations for his patients. despite your initial confusion, you still agreed to help either way — to help others is something you like to do, occasionally.

“here, see if you like this,” jiaoqiu, yet again, calls you over as he motions for you to try something he’s eager for you to taste. of course you can't say no — although you're busy mixing something in one of the pots and the two of you are just a few feet apart in the kitchen — you faced your body towards him and moved forwards. you notice him offering something that seems to have filling of some sorts, it looks delicious too that you can't seem to resist... well, it's jiaoqiu; anything he makes is very appetizing.

with an eager bite, the treat yielded to your teeth, releasing a burst of flavor that spread across your tongue. the creamy filling mingled with the crisp outer layer, creating a harmonious blend that made you hum with delight. the contrasting textures and tastes melded together perfectly, creating a delicious explosion on your palate. you hum in delight, expressing your visible contentment.

“mm, that's good.”

you comment, gazing back at jiaoqiu with a smile and he smiles back; satisfied with your reaction as he settles the treat to the side on a plate.

“I think your food's trying to escape—it's on your face,” the foxian chuckles as he points out the small mess you had on the side of your mouth, where a smudge of filling lingers as you savor the last bites of the treat. you murmur a small ‘oh,’ and your hand reaches to wipe it off for yourself.

then, with a quick motion, jiaoqiu swipes the smudge of filling from your face onto his finger before you could. pausing for a moment, he brought it to his lips and licked it right off.

“mm...” he lets out a noise of consideration, a playful glint in his eyes as he savors the flavor. “... delicious.”

the peach foxian whispers and leans in, pressing a brief yet tender kiss to the corner of your mouth where the smudge had been, a fleeting act of affection that lingers longer in your heart than on your skin. without a word, he steps away, returning to whatever task had called him, as if the moment was as natural as breathing.

for a heartbeat, the world feels suspended, the gentle warmth of his gesture radiating through you. it’s only the soft bubbling of the soup in the pot that pulls you back to reality, your hand resuming its stirring almost instinctively. though your thoughts remain adrift, you can't help replaying the sweetness of the moment in your head.

© thedemises 2024. do not feed to ai, copy, steal, rewrite, or claim as your own. I will hunt you down for my sake.

[fantasticgothicpeachsludge]

“he's like a brother to me”...”he's my best friend”....

[answermywearyquery]

the theerapanyakul kids: how close are you with each other?

loan’s kinnporsche 2nd anniversary: favourite familial relationship: the theerapanyakul kids (insp: ½+½)

[redysetdare]

I think i just need to express that the culture surrounding QPRs right now made me think that i couldn't have strong bonds with my friends. Society told me i cant have strong bonds with friends because that was only for romantic relationships. Then i went into aro spaces and this idea was reinforced using QPRs instead of romantic relationships. it was "You can still have strong bonds with people without romance! It can just be a QPR instead!" "QPRs are MORE than friendship so you can have STRONGER BONDS than you would with friends."

it made me think that the relationships i wanted with my friends HAD to be something other than friendship for it to be as strong as i wanted. If i wanted to be the first person in someones life i had to enter some sort of committed relationship. if I wanted someone to care about me as strongly as i did them then it would have to be a relationship that was "more" than friendship.

I thought I wanted a QPR because i was told the only way to get that care and security that I wanted was to enter into a relationship that was "more" than friendship. because friends didn't care that much. because friends didn't live together their entire lives. because friends were never the priority relationship wise. and it took me years to realize that i didn't want any partnership and i shouldn't have to be in one to want these things from a friend. these things CAN be something friends can do. but i found that out on my own. because the aro community kept saying "you want a QPR" when i just wanted a friend who finally saw me as a priority in their life.

[pumpkster]

[starry-bi-sky]

Okay so this is almost a direct copy-paste of my earlier reblog but only the Xin Yuan parts, because its long enough to be its own post and i want to share it! It deserves it's own post <3 typical starry stuff to write a 2k word long reblog, unfortunately.

I say almost because I went through to proof read and ended up adding more stuff.

I've been cooking on this idea for the last two days since I saw the Xin Mo!Shen Yuan post but??? I can't find anything on Xin Mo's backstory or how it came to be -- which means that's free fucking plot right there baby. That's a sandbox and im making LIFE SIZED CASTLES. I'm so excited.

The idea of Shen Yuan transmigrating centuries before the events of PIDW as Xin Mo -- but when he wakes up, he's not the sword. He wakes up in the body of a young boy named Xin Yuan. Now it makes sense for this boy to be a demon, but the drama, the intrigue, the spice of Xin Yuan being a human child.

SY wakes up as a boy below the age of ten, and the System tells him where he is, and SY is excited to meet his favorite protagonist -- only to gradually realize that he's like, a thousand years or so before the events of the novel. The rant he gives the system is legendary.

Bc what's the point of getting dropped into PIDW if he's never going to meet his favorite character??? This is a scam! BUT he settles into his new life, he's like, some orphan street rat or some other tragic airplane-esq backstory.

The system gives Shen Yuan his first mandatory quest: become a righteous cultivator. Which was like, kinda his plan/hopes anyways, except! There's like?? No official cultivator sects anywhere? The Cang Qiong Mountain Sect hasn't even been established yet, and there are pockets of cultivators running around, maybe some groups or schools popping up and then sinking back down, but nothing's really taken root!

If he asks someone how to become a cultivator, there's no straight answer. No "oh you can go to X to do that". He's pissed! How can he become a cultivator if there aren't any schools around to teach him? Deus ex machina, that's how.

Out of sheer luck, SY manages to help save a rogue cultivator, and promptly gets adopted by said rogue cultivator, who gives SY the name 'Xin Yuan'. He is ecstatic. And you know what? It's actually pretty fun!

He's getting to travel the world of PIDW in its early stages, and gets to see the building blocks for the eventual main story. He's discovering all this local flora and fauna that are foreign to his old world and unmentioned in the book, and he's learning cultivation! Granted, its unsafe, newly(ish) discovered cultivation, but it counts!

Wistfully, he thinks about perhaps he'll do something grand and get his name carved into legend. Something that would eventually help the protagonist later down the line in his quest for revenge.

The system remains silent to his thoughts.

But Xin Yuan doesn't take much stock in that daydream anyways. It's nothing more than fantasy to him; wish-fulfillment. He does discover however, that he is positively brimming with spiritual energy. Overwhelmingly so.

It's both a blessing and a curse, as it puts a strain on his meridians if he's not careful, and leaves him prone to qi deviations for the exact same reasons. He already has a heart demon or two from a few traumatic experiences in the past.

(bc hey! angst a day keeps the writer sadism at bay, and all that)

I'll say he's about... eight when he gets picked up by the rogue cultivator, who I'm calling Lin Kai bc he deserves a name. They travel around PIDW up until Xin Yuan is twelve, where he goes through a traumatic experience that results in a heart demon.

It's after that that Lin Kai decides to put a stop to his wandering, and find a place to settle down to raise Xin Yuan in. Coincidentally! They settle down in a nice mountain region that's thriving with spiritual energy. The mountains at the time were called something different, but they will be eventually known as the Cang Qiong Mountain Sect

Coincidentally, the mountain Lin Kai and Xin Yuan end up on is Qing Jing Peak. XY does not realize that the mountain he's on is Qing Jing. The System does not tell him. But he likes it there, more than he was expecting. And as much as he's traveled around, he really does enjoy being in one place.

He has a tendency to go down the mountain and help the village setting up down there, and when he's a teenager he starts venturing out more and more.

Xin Yuan forgets sometimes that he's in a novel, especially after settling down on Qing Jing peak. The system becomes remarkably quiet since there's no quests for him to do and not a ton of opportunities to get B-Points. He cultivates with Lin Kai, helps tend to the garden they're growing, goes down to the village to play with the other kids.

There's one boy he's best friends with, a boy whose not all that good with words, named Liu Zhihao. He's got potential for cultivation though, so Xin Yuan drags him up the mountain when he can so that Liu Zhihao can sit in on lessons with Lin Kai. He drags him all over the forest at the foot of the mountain to go look at bugs and animals.

(One time, when they're fourteen and Liu Zhihao has been learning cultivation for a few years now, Xin Yuan drags him out of bed late one night to go look at the stars. Xin Yuan tells Liu Zhihao about ascension -- something that still feels like a far off dream to many in this time -- that night, while they're sitting on the wet grass.)

("We should ascend together." Xin Yuan tells Liu Zhihao, jade eyes gleaming. Never let it be said that Xin Yuan doesn't love deeply, no matter what kind of love it is. He was always so lonely as Shen Yuan, Liu Zhihao is his best friend. "We'll become immortals, and then we won't ascend until the other is able to.")

(Liu Zhihao stares at him silently, his face unreadable. Then, quietly, he asks; "Promise?")

("Promise.")

When he starts adventuring outwards, further away from the mountain and the village, Liu Zhihao sticks to him like rice. Not that Xin Yuan's complaining, that's his best friend after all, and Liu Zhihao has become a formidable cultivator. He deserves to show off his skills.

He starts making something of a name for himself by the time he's, like, 18 -- although that name is in its baby steps, along with Liu Zhihao. They're slowly growing renown.

Perhaps XY uses his knowledge of PIDW and cultivation in general to help make advancements in the cultivation field. Although the system prevents him from sharing too much, it doesn't mean he can't practice it himself. Perhaps he's one of the first cultivators to develop a golden core. One of the first known immortal cultivators. One of the first to have a spirit sword.

(Although I don't know the logistics of any of this since my knowledge on xanxia/cultivation stuff in general is all still pretty new and google wasn't all that helpful lol.)

Either way, its my excuse to eventually make Xin Yuan come across as ethereal to other people. Peerless beauty SY for the win. Hs wifebeam is too strong, Xin Yuan has a line of suitors following after him and he's completely unaware of it. The rest of history is not.

Demon realm stuff has been stirring up since Xin Yuan was a kid, but at the time it was rare and in the beginning stages. Its been steadily ramping up and the system is sending him on more and more treacherous quests -- some of them mandatory, some optional. SY doesn't often take the optional ones unless it comes with a sufficient B-point reward.

for all intents and purposes though, he's a wandering rogue cultivator with Liu Zhihao, going from place to place to either help a town or village, or to discover more creatures or artifacts (although there aren't that many). Just all around living his life. He participates in a few major quest lines that are sure to get him mentioned in legend, even if it's a background character way.

(Unbeknownst to him, rather than being a side character in these legends, he's named directly. You can't become one of the first immortal cultivators and NOT get name dropped for clout.)

He has a spirit sword named Shā Mó, (杀 shā - to kill/weaken/counteract/reduce) (魔 mó - evil spirit, demon, possession). He routinely goes back to QJP to see Lin Kai, or to rest when traveling has worn down on him and he wants nothing more than to sleep somewhere he knows he'll be safe in. It becomes more frequent as Xin Yuan becomes more famous. Liu Zhihao often comes with him.

it all comes to a head though when the rifts between the demonic realm and the human realm become too great, and the balance between both realms becomes unstable. A demonic emperor's influence, wanting to merge the two realms so he could conquer both to satiate his own greed.

Typical evil king stuff. This comes to a climatic head in a great battle between every cultivator available and the demon emperor's army. Xin Yuan was one of the many who helped lead the charge.

In the end, it was Xin Yuan who ends up defeating the demonic emperor, but the rift that the emperor used to cross between worlds is destabilizing as well. Except instead of trying to close, it's getting bigger and bigger, threatening to swallow the heavens and earth and demonic realm whole.

You know how Yue Qingyuan's soul is bonded to his sword due to a qi deviation? Let's take it a step further >:)

Xin Yuan uses himself and Shā Mó to close the rift. However, it takes all of his spiritual energy to do so, as well as him filtering the demonic qi into his body to redirect it back to the demon realm.

In the end, Xin Yuan and his beloved sword Shā Mó fuse. Xin Yuan's soul becomes trapped in the sword. His physical body is unable to handle the immense amount of power it takes to close the rift, and is destroyed. He is immortalized in legend by his grieving cultivators.

(Liu Zhihao ends up ascending alone. He ascends with the hope that one day he'll see Xin Yuan again, even if it's in the face of someone else. Lin Kai does not ascend, too weighed down by the grief of losing his son.)

Xin Yuan, now Xin Mo, falls into a stasis. He's very confused and disorientated when he regains 'consciousness'. The system has been silent for most of his life, only popping up to give him mandatory quests, hints, points, or to answer any questions.

But once he wakes up, it cheerfully pops up again, congratulating him on completing the origin story of Xin Mo. SY freaks the fuck out. he'd shake the system screen if he could, but he doesn't have arms. or legs. or eyes for that matter.

He can sense his surroundings, but its all like imprints to him. He can sense the energies, but he can't see anything. It's all very disorientating and horrifying after years of being human. Like a sensory deprivation chamber.

The closing of the rift and the cycling demonic qi tainted both Sha Mo and Xin Yuan irreparably, and it did some kind of damage that resulted in SY needing to feed in order to use the spiritual powers. Kinda like how Xuan Su uses YQY's life force for it's spiritual energy, but instead of feeding on his own lifeforce, Xin Mo feeds on others.

The rest is history. Xin Mo is originally tied to the story of Xin Yuan -- believed to be all that remained of the man after he sacrificed himself to keep the realms separate. It's believed that the force of the realms closing permanently infused Sha Mo with demonic energy, turning it into Xin Mo.

But, like many stories do when faced against the tide of time, things get lost; chipped off; changed. Xin Mo is steadily separated from Xin Yuan, especially once it becomes clear how parasitic the sword really is, until they are all but separate entities themselves and the origin of Xin Mo's creation all but forgotten.

The years blur together when Xin Mo is not being wielded, and at first Xin Yuan was agonized by the fact that he stole the lives of all his wielders. He knows it's only a novel, but his decades spent in this life have softened him, and he's grown attached to the world around him.

But time erodes the mind like water erodes stone, and he becomes numb to it, then eventually anticipating of it. He forces himself to remember what he knows of PIDW's plot, and kinda fixates back on his old obsession on Luo Binghe. But while PIDW stays in his mind, his memories as Xin Yuan fall to the wayside.

Not forgotten, per se, but... tucked away. The system prevents him from forgetting fully.

Xin Mo isn't fully a demonic sword either i think, but instead harbors an ugly cocktail of both spiritual and demonic qi. Special circumstances and all that. Everyone just assumes he's a fully demonic sword because that's usually at the forefront, his spiritual qi weakened from the initial fusion and from years of not being fed spiritual qi. It's part of the reason his wielders always end up destroyed by him, other than the whole, yk, 'overwhelming qi' thing.

Nobody would recognize Xin Mo's human form as Xin Yuan other than some truly ancient demons. Of which Meng Mo might. But even that's iffy because there's a lack of surviving paintings of Xin Yuan, but also because of XM's demonic appearance and supposed lack of connection to XY.

Xin Mo has never spoken to his wielders before, not in the same way he does Luo Binghe. He tells Luo Binghe this, and he also tells Luo Binghe down the line that he is both spiritual and demonic -- something he also never told his wielders because there was no point to it.

okay okay i've got to end it here because its already gotten ridiculously long -- of which im both apologetic and unapologetic for -- but i DO think the Shang Qinghua and Shen Yuan meeting (and reveal) would be fucking hilarious. Especially if SY has learned how to pop between sword form and human form by then -- although i guess it doesnt matter either way because SQH's reaction is still the same.

And that reaction is internally screaming and going "hey what the FUCK?? WHY DOES XIN MO HAVE A HUMAN FORM??? WHAT IS THIS??? SYSTEM??? EXPLAIN???"

meanwhile from his place on the sword hilt xin mo is squinting at Shang Qinghua in bewilderment and going "aren't you supposed to be dead" but doesn't pay too much mind to it because its not like its going to change anything.

...up until he catches shang qinghua going "WTF" silently from his little corner while all eyes are off him. One moment SQH is standing beside his king, and the next he's been tackled to the ground by one wild-eyed, human-shaped Xin Mo.

everyone, including SQH, thinks Xin Mo is going to kill him. It is a surprise to everyone when he does not, and instead dissolves into deranged, uncontrollable laughter after spitting out some phrase in some ancient tongue and watching SQH's eyes grow wide in recognition.

[qprstobin]

Controversial opinion but unless Steve and Eddie were friends prior to season 4, he's not going to be like spending all of his time at his bedside in the hospital 😭 if he's going to be that overprotective and not leave the hospital it's bc he is sleeping on the floor next to Max's bed, he's the one who thought she was gone too long! She gave him a letter! He's been looking out for her since S2! Like I'm sorry but a whirlwind infatuation is not going to take precedence over one of his kids/surrogate siblings???