#lichen answers

[lichenaday]

hey you said that you study lichen, does that include growing them? my mum keeps trying to grow lichen off fallen branches and they just die. does anyone know how to grow them?

So my lab is one of many lichen lab groups trying to grow lichens and like, no, you really can't. Even with our super specialized equipment and knowledge and light and climate and humidity controls, we can only grow lichens for a short amount of time. Lichens function on a completely different time-scale than a lot of other organisms. They grow very slowly, and so adapt pretty precisely to where they are. And if something in their environment changes or they move to a new location, their first response is to go into a dormant state and wait for conditions to improve, and if possible, slowly adapt to these new conditions outside the scale of human observation. I am talking like, decades of slow progress. We also think that the microorganisms associated with lichens might play a more key role in their growth than we are aware of, but that is just a theory. Don't quote me on that. We still aren't entirely sure. Lots of folks are trying to figure this out in light of climate change and expanding habitat degradation--both to better understand lichen adaptability and ecophysiological responses to this rapidly changing world, and to house and cultivate endangered species before we lose them in nature.

Also as a side note, there's a cafe in my town that has a "moss wall" that is just Cladonia lichen dyed green (the kind you often find in craft stores). The waiter there was like "It's living! We spray it every day so it stays healthy!" and I was just like . . . girl ok whatever.

[jbbartram-illu]

Would you be open to sharing your lichen tattoo? That sounds awesome!

Totally!! I love showing it off & as a bonus (?) I'll also throw in my latest tattoo (from february), a hand-poked Lascaux horse (I plan to add two more so I have a small bicep-herd)!

Lichen:

& Lascaux-horse (the closeup was from right after it was done, so it's a little angry-looking...I still need a proper fully-healed photo, but the awkward, look ma, same horse! snapshot is all I have for now)

[thunderworks]

slides in to ask about your au again

uhhh what are the flowers/lycanthropy like (if you've got a concept for them wjeelkzsedldf)

same for barracuda-

random fun facts about beetle if you've got any perchance,,

HAYLO 💥

Lichen: a little gremlin of a creature. Did not exist before game events. Beetle made him on accident while messing with the Tree shard’s powers. Something of a cricket-puppy.

Notes on the page

feral little beast of a man

born pink from a corrupted triangle as Beetle was messing with his power

neck spikes

jumping legs (cricket?)

spike tail looks like a bunny 😔

(I’m actually not too opposed to the tail now, I think it’s cute. That was the main homage to the original flowers in the game)

Flowers: TBD

Barracuda: TBD

random fun facts about Beetle 🪲

Actually a very good cook, he just doesn’t feel like making anything complicated unless guests come over

Will make things when Bloc comes over

Still has a soft spot for taking care of plants, now that he’s no longer a farmer. Maintains a tiny garden outside of the cave

Bloc brought him seeds of more variety

Remains living in the cave after game events, it’s one of the only existing structures large enough for him to live in. A group effort makes it substantially more cozy (including a giant quilt made by many grandmas)

Heli is initially extremely apprehensive of him. They’re concerned about Bloc going to visit, not wanting her to get sick. Warms up to Beetle once she sees how gentle he is in-person

Kindof scared of Cyan both before & after game events

Mentor figure to Citrine (Circle), sees himself in them

Favorite pie is lemon pie

Im contemplating a Pikuniku crossover. Two pink “monsters” who live in a cave & like to take care of plants

[transmasc-wizard]

nanowrimo day one opening paragraph woo

[bugintheruins]

to add on to last ask i mean smthn like the 2's reactions or like .......... interior design choices, tea time

MEANT TO ANSWER AGES AGO heres some teatime while discussing music :]

and heres some more doodles :'D

[firelightfoxes]

your picture of Lichen was just so charming and given my username I felt I just HAD to draw her :D enjoy!

omg... i don't even have the words for how this makes me feel!!! i love it so much, i love the colors and you captured her expression perfectly. when i saw that you followed i was like hell yeah, target audience REACHED. thank you so much for this!!!

[balthazarslostlibrary]

Do you prefer lichen composed of algae or cyanobacteria?

An extremely good question.

I enjoy both, however my favourite genus of lichen is the Cladonia genus, in which I am including both the Cladonia and Cladina morphotypes, which are lichens that primarily associate with algae. I love their little cups and horns, and some are quite beautiful. Related lichen such as Pulchrocladia sp. are also very very pretty and make me think of lacy dresses. I would love to see an outfit based off of P retipora.

Here are some photos I have of Cladonia sp.

Cladonia sp. Cladonia morphotype. Note the singularly attached, un-branched cups and horns, growing from small wart like deposits on the ground.

Cladonia sp. Cladina morphotype. Highly branched with much thinner cups and horns. More moss-like.

Pulchrocladia rangifera, not in the Cladonia genus, in the same family. Possibly one of the prettiest lichens I have seen.

I do love cyanobacteria associated lichens such as the dog lichens found in the genus Peltigera, purely because they have such striking dark blue colourations, almost to the point of being black. See below a dog lichen I found as part of a trip collecting herbarium samples.

Fun fact, in the process of digging this lichen out of the rotting log it was on, the safety catch failed on the knife I was using and closed so heavily on my finger that it severe the nerves on the end of my index finger!

[channelsoph]

do you ever think about lichen

well i do now yeah… assuming you meant the fungi and algae symbiosis and not the skin disease.

last year i used to think a lot about mushrooms in general, cause the system of it is fascinating and scary. and of course because The Last Of Us

there was this book that i really liked called “Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds and Shape Our Futures” by Merlin Sheldrake. great mushroom book, 10/10 would recommend. i don’t specifically remember it focusing on lichen but it’s a great read all in all

i really liked the description of lichen on USDA Forest Sevice. they describe it as symbiosis of two separate organisms, fungus and algae, and the use phrase “dominant partner” for fungus. i bet someone already wrote a fanfiction/created art about this dynamic lmao i would be 100% down to read/behold

i’m fully yapping at this point but i held an art exhibition last year which explored macro and microstructures and there was this girl who’s art stood out to me. her art process was that she gathered samples of organisms in the forest, studied them under a microscope and created her works based on those studies. the outcome were these beautiful abstract paintings where she used different media to convey the structure of those organisms. one of the paintings was named “Moss and Mushrooms”, i think it does the fungus justice

Lea Hoffbauer, “Moss and Mushrooms”, 2020 (on the right)

here’s a link to her website if you want to explore more of her works <3

[lichenhaunt]

I had a dream last night that we hung out in person and you gave me stellar outfit advice 🖤

A sign from God himself ur taste is trash tbh

[liches-covered-in-lich]

2, 3 and 10 for the artist ask game!! :D

(ha ignore that it has been Almost a Year AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH)

Thanks for the ask, bestie!!!

2. Is it easier to draw someone facing left or right (or forward even)

From the front as I can just cheat and use the mirror tool. But it makes adding details fun hehehe

3. What ideas come from when you were little

Oh as a kiddo, I fuckin LOVED minecraft. I had so many mincraft ocs from the game, Aphmau roleplays, and devianart comic series! Also funny enough, that one 3d ninja turtle series gave me a lot of inspiration. I made a cat dragon hybrid oc!

10. Favorite piece of clothing to draw

S l e e v es. Especially puffy ones. I love the folds <3 makes me fall in love with art all over again

[lichenaday]

May I ask a question on lichens? I'm writing a series where some partially organic robots can grow their own materials due to their individual components being alive, and for example their brain is a slime mold and their skin is made of lichen. Which type of lichen would be most believable in this context?

That sounds like a cool concept. Very Scavenger's Regin (if you haven't seen it, I encourage everyone who can tolerate body horror to watch it). Look, they are all probably equally unlikely, so you can go ham with it. It's your story do what you want. But for like, a little bit of realism, there are some lichens that are better at growing on synthetic substrates and are more adaptable and fast growing than others. Xanthoria parietina is probably the most adaptable lichen out there. Will pretty much grow wherever on whatever

Xanthoparmelia is another lichen genus commonly found colonizing metal, plastic, cloth, and even glass

It could also be cool to see robots from different environments with different lichen species adapted to their climate conditions! Or maybe the select based on aesthetics. Whatever you do, I am just glad you are integrating lichen into your worldbuilding!

[botanyshitposts]

hey i found this guy in ireland by the sea recently- looks like it's growing in waves?

any idea what's up with that?

thanks!

asks to put in the vault for a simple answer in 100 years when humanity learns how lichens work

[silentheiss]

“Five years?” Shen Qingqiu gasped. “I can’t see my husband for five years, because you can’t write a single fucking page of an adequate plot?”

Shang Qinghua took another step back. He’s been doing it every couple of minutes since he’s burst into Shen Qingqiu’s house, carrying the worst news ever.

“Well, to be completely fair, this particular plot line didn’t make it to the novel!” The hamster of a man squeaked. Shen Qingqiu knew he was making himself look pathetic on purpose. He took great satisfaction in knowing that it wouldn’t help him in the slightest.

“Oh! In such case it’s fine I guess! Your shitty novel didn’t suffer.” Shen Qingqiu snapped his fan open and took a step towards Shang Qinghua. “It’s only a small matter of my marriage, then.”

“Cucumber-bro,” Shang Qinghua pleaded. “I’m so, so sorry, but at least I got here in time, right? What’s five years for immortal cultivators? Painful death would be much worse.”

He was right about that, at least. Painful death that Shen Qingqiu was about to inflict on his ex-best-friend would be horrific.

“I will kill you now.” He said. “Don’t forget to tell me how painful it is.”

Shang Qinghua scrammed. Shen Qingqiu let him, but only because his knees were a little weak and he wasn’t about to embarrass himself by collapsing in the middle of murder attempt.

He took a careful breath and lowered himself on the nearest surface, which turned out to be the floor, but he was at his house and there was no one to witness that. He could sit on the floor all he wanted. Because his husband got himself cursed and wouldn’t be coming back home anytime soon — if at all.

Five years.

Shen Qingqiu sat on the floor of Bamboo House for what must’ve been a long time, because when Liu Qingge barged in it was already dark.

“Shixiong.”

“Liu-shidi.” Shen Qingqiu blinked up at him. “Why are you here?”

“Your disciples worried.”

Ah, Ming Fan and his snitching habits.

“This master is fine.” Shen Qingqiu said. He didn’t try to stand up — his legs have long since gone numb.

“You don’t look fine, do you?”

Liu-shidi, since when are you so talkative?!

Shen Qingqiu frowned and decided not to deign his martial brother with an answer.

“Binghe got cursed.” His mouth said without his consent. “Eternal Heart-Penury Winds. In Lichen Caves. He forgot me and everything connected to me. It’s not for actual eternity, though, if I stay away from him for five years. If I fail, and he sees my face for even a second, then it’s for eternity. How’s that?”

Liu Qingge didn’t say anything. Which, of course he didn’t. What was Shen Qingqiu even thinking, talking to him about it? He knew his Shidi was allergic to feelings of any kind.

It’s just that he wouldn’t see Luo Binghe for five whole years. They’ve been married for four and a half. How was one supposed to react to such a thing?

“I’ll make you some tea.” Liu Qingge muttered and left the room. Shen Qingqiu stayed on the floor, mind just as numb as his body.

[aloysiavirgata]

She walks in beauty, like the night

Scully in the simplest, blackest silk. Scully pale, moon-kissed, vulnerable. Scully’s hair and eyes like where the stars are born.

***

Scully comes to him when even the moon is all but asleep, like a single calla lily from a secret admirer. Unbidden. Unexpected.

Unparalleled.

“Mulder,” she says, outside his open door, in a negligee that last shade of sky blue before it goes pitch black.

Spaghetti straps and a low décolletage, though not shockingly low. Lace trim, mid thigh. It looks like something Katharine Hepburn would wear to slap you.

Not you. Him.

Specifically him.

She looks up at him through her heavy-lashed, heavy-lidded eyes.

He stares at her for his own sake because deep in his 12 year old heart, no one would ever, ever, believe that nerdy Fox Muld-

Scully takes another step closer onto the sad oatmeal carpet of his hotel room. She has such pretty ankles, she has such pretty calves. She smells like honeysuckle and hot bike tires and buttery lobster rolls and the sweetest, purest moments of his life.

She tips her face up to him, Agent Scully does, all eyes and lips and cheekbones like a geometric proof.

“God,” he says. And he means it.

***

LA belongs to the sun and Scully is a San Diego baby but he knows, he knows, she is an East Coast girl at heart. He knows she loves the first retinal purple-orange sunrises of America and the first sapphire kisses of night. He knows she loves the stars by which her father learned to navigate. He knows she loves the distant moon.

He knows she loves blue crabs and wool duffel coats and khaki shorts and aspires to East Hampton in her most secret, silent heart.

One day he will make love to her in London because she will, he knows, hark to the call of the City. She is a creature of old stone and lichen and liminal space.

She is the answer to Samson’s riddle.

***

He’d rented a jet black ‘57 Chevy Bel Air because Christ, this girl. Abductions and cancer and the most awful brutality and stolen ova and Christ; this brilliant, moonbeam girl.

She sees the car and she says nothing. But her eyes, her eyes. Her Star of India eyes.

Scully sees the car and she smiles, shy. Scully squeezes his hand.

***

He fucks her - hard, desperate - in the Chevy out over Mullholland and she cries out for him because even Saint Teresa writhed in ecstasy.

He kisses her the way a mariner kisses his homeland soil because she is his human credential. He kisses her like a Torah scroll. He shudders, murmurs I love you, I love you into the hot, sweet dark of her mouth.

***

She is bleeding, just a little. She is bleeding in the warm caress of a Southern California night. She is bleeding as though she were a virgin and maybe she is; maybe there is sex and there is fucking and there is making love and there is This.

Are you there, god? It’s me, Dana.

She touches his sleeping rosebud lips. She touches his funny nose and his beautiful jaw and she doesn’t say I love you aloud like he had because she’d learned it was shameful. She’d learned to salute.

But it’s 3 AM, neither properly morning nor properly night. It’s 3 AM and she isn’t LA pretty, not by a long shot, but she’s here with him, with Mulder, who is very LA pretty and has money besides.

She’s too short and too pale and her nose is patrician rather than cute and she gets burnt instead of tan. She doesn’t laugh in the right places at movies. She likes copper because it burns green, she likes moths more than butterflies, she can quote Jane Austen’s most acerbic lines.

She thinks of Mulder swimming hard across the Vineyard tides, Mulder with his cinnamon skin in the whipped cream breakers. Riding a red fixed-gear along Lake Tashmoo, tugging his tiny sister along. Mulder basking on the beach like a young god of summer. Mulder with his heart afire like Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque.

Her father is dead and look, look Mulder has such a tender soul even if he’s Jewish and atheist, Daddy. Mulder has eyes like fern moss.

“I love you,” she says, her eyes brimming with tears, her eyes bright as the newest stars.

[grand-theft-carbohydrates]

-can a boy who hops really fall in love with a girl who flies?-

"Watch me, Swallow!" cried the frog, "this'll be the one, I just know it!" 

The frog hurled himself out of the water with every ounce of all his might, and went sailing through the air. His wet little body landed with a splat against the lichen-covered side of the old well. Surface tension kept him stuck there for a brief moment before gravity re-exerted its influence and he slid down the stone wall like a blob of snot, tumbling back into the water with a gentle plop. 

The swallow quickly hopped over to the rim of the well and peered over the edge. She sat there motionlessly, her beady eyes fixed on the dark, rippling water from where the frog vanished, counting the seconds. She did not look away until a sleek, green head broke through the surface at last. 

"I made it halfway up, didn't I?" Frog asked proudly. 

"I don't see what you're so happy about," Swallow sniffed, making a show of preening her glossy wings, "you're still nowhere near the top." 

"Yeah, but last month I could only make it a quarter of the way up, and last week I was almost at the half-way mark," said Frog, not at all dampened by Swallow's grim dose of reality. "I'm making more progress every day. If I work hard enough, I'll be able to jump out of here soon." 

"Hm," the swallow gave a non-committal chirp. She had soared across continents and had seen frogs of every shape and size. None of them could make it out of a well so steep and high, and this one was fast approaching the limits of his nature. He would make it to the half-way mark, and rise no more. The old well that had harboured him as a tadpole would also be his grave, and that was the cold, hard truth. The kindest thing for her to do would be to kill Frog's stupid dream before it grew and festered, like removing a maggot from an open wound; one sharp twist, and it would be over. It would sting and bleed, he might even hate her for it, but eventually the injury would heal over cleanly. He would make peace with his position in life. She would take to the skies once more. It would be the healthy thing for everyone. 

But when the frog asked, again and again, "Will you watch me?" the swallow always kept her doubts to herself and answered, "Yes." 

He kept wasting his strength on these fruitless leaps, burning through what meagre prey that fell into his well. She kept putting herself in harm's way by watching him. Perched on the edge of this stone rim, she was vulnerable to attacks, to foxes slinking along the ground and hawks patrolling the sky. Her pretty, scissor-shaped tail still bore the marks of a particularly harrowing close call. This could only end badly for both of them; Frog might have been ignorant to the world beyond his stone circle, but she ought to know better. 

"It helps to have a goal," the frog panted. "After I jump out, I'm going to marry you! We'll travel the world together, and you can show me all the wonderful things you talked about." 

"Marry me?" The swallow stopped mid-preen and stared down at him, as if the frog had suddenly spouted a second head. 

"Yeah! I want to be your husband! I've been making a list on where we'd go after the wedding. First we'll visit your family-in-the-barn, then we'll go to the city and say hi to your cousins-in-the-rafters. I don't know where my folks are, cause I was hatched in this well so we'll skip that part. After that, we'll go to the Western Sea to see the Dragon King--" 

"I can't swim, stupid," The swallow pointed out with a derisive laugh. The whole thing was so outlandish she might as well play along. Poke holes in this fantasy until he dropped the subject.

"I know that!" said the frog, who had in fact forgotten, "...you can wait on the beach, I'll pop down and ask him to come out." 

"And if his royal highness says no?" 

"Then he's a prick who's not worth seeing," the frog said hotly, offended by the mere thought of such a thing. Swallow was the most beautiful creature he'd ever laid eyes on, with her black, iridescent wings that shone like a rainbow, and bright red crown which shamed the sunset. Anyone who refused to see her had to be blind and stupid and was not worth the time of day. The two-leggers who used to visit his well and scoop up water liked to talk about wondrous creatures called "fairies" who lived up in Heaven. When Swallow flew down the first time and sang her song, Frog's heart was beating so fast he thought it would burst right out of his chest. He was dead certain a real fairy couldn't possibly compare to her. "If the Dragon King proves to be a royal prick, I'll steal his pearl and bring it back for you. We'll be gone before he even realises it's missing!" 

"You're going to bring calamity down on tianxia if you do that." 

"Who gives a shit about tianxia?" answered the frog, "I only care about making you happy." 

At these words, the swallow leaped up and hopped rapidly around the rim several times, as she sometimes did when the rocks were hot. This confused the frog, because the day was overcast and the rocks could not have been hot--he was very attentive to these matters, being an amphibian who was vulnerable to drying out. The swallow did not speak, and the frog was afraid he'd upset her, so he decided to give her some space and practice his jumps, hoping to impress her this time. Unfortunately, he was tired and his belly was empty, so they weren't anywhere near as awesome as the first one. He made up his mind to wake up extra early tomorrow morning and have a big breakfast of gnats. Then he can train longer while it was still light.

"Well, will you do it?" the frog asked, floating gently to the surface after his final attempt of the day. "Aiyouyou, my legs are sore…" 

"Do what?" said the swallow, pretending not to understand.

"Be my wife," said Frog, "Please, I love you so much. I've never been in love before, so I'm not sure what it feels like, but when you landed here for the first time and told me about the Outside I felt something I had never felt before. A feeling that was much too big for one frog. Like…like trying to drink a whole thunderstorm of rain at once. I thought I would explode--!" 

"Ew." 

"…in a good way, of course," Frog amended, "I want to feel like this forever and ever and ever." 

"Don't say such stupid things," said Swallow, puffing up her feathers, though she was not at all cold. "I'm a bird. You're a frog. It'll never work." 

"Why not?" 

"Because it's never been done! We're two different creatures! There must be laws about it, or something…" 

"How can you know it won't work if it's never been done?" 

"It just won't, ok?" the swallow snapped, "stop being annoying or I'll fly off!" 

Frog did not stop. He was very persistent. Ever since the day his tail grew into legs and his gills became lungs, he'd been reaching for things that were higher than him. He caught all his bugs this way. "Do you want to stay with me?" he asked quietly. 

"I'm here, aren't I?" the swallow scoffed, refusing to meet his eyes. She started scratching at the crumbling mortar with her claws, like she was hoping to find a worm inside the rocks.

"And do I make you happy?" 

"You make me want to peck you to death!" 

"Would pecking me to death make you happy?"

The swallow shut her beak stubbornly and glared off into the distance. Frog swam over to one of the jutting rocks and climbed up as high as he could go. "Swallow, Swallow, if you really hate me just chirp once and I'll never talk about marriage again. But if you do like me, even a tiny little bit, then say nothing at all." 

Swallow glared at him so venomously it would have made a cobra tremble, but she did not make a single sound, nor did she fly off. Her silence was as good as the world's loudest declaration. Frog was so happy he forgot about his sore legs. He leapt into the water and started doing summersaults. 

"I know I'm very ugly, but I promise I'll make a good husband," he said breathlessly, in between his tricks, "I'll catch lots of bugs for you to eat. The biggest bluebottles, and the fattest, sweetest worms. I'll find a nice, big pond for your eggs, and chase away any fish that tries to eat them." 

"I don't lay eggs in ponds, stupid," sighed the swallow, hiding her face in her wing, "I lay them in trees." 

"Then I'll chase away all the fishes in the trees! I'm very fast!" 

Swallow leapt up from her perch in a flurry of feathers, and in an instant she was gone. Vanished into the small circle of sky that had once been the frog's entire world. For a moment, Frog was so shocked he didn't even cry out. He floated there numbly inside his dark, empty well. Now as silent as a tomb without the swallow to talk to. The cosy walls that had once been his home suddenly felt hateful. Like the cavernous throat of some great beast, keeping him trapped in here. Why did he have to open his big mouth and ruin the moment? What if she was gone for good? Each second alone felt like an eternity past. Suddenly, the frog heard the whirring of wings, and his beautiful swallow appeared silhouetted in the opening, a dozen twigs clasped in her beak. 

"Swallow! You came back!"

Swallow did not answer him. She threw the twigs over the side of the well, and was off before they had time to fall into the water. Frog ducked quickly under the surface to avoid getting hit. This was good! She could chuck all the things she wanted at him. In fact, she could stay mad at him forever if it pleased her, just as long as she never left him. 

Swallow came back and threw in a large tuff of grass, still green, with the roots attached. Then a small pinecone. Then three empty snail shells. Most of the stuff wasn't even that heavy, it was like she was just picking up random objects and throwing them in for the hell of it. This went on until the sun had set, and Frog was left floating in a pool of detritus with scarcely any room to kick. Swallow swooped down at last to rest, her cloud-white breast heaving from the exertion. 

"I'm tired and it's too dark," she said with great dignity, after catching her breath. "That old bastard owl is eyeing me up, so I'm going to bed. I'll come back tomorrow and add more stuff." 

"More stuff?" croaked the confused frog.

"I'm going to fill up the well. Make the water level rise so you can get out." 

"What?" Frog cried out, his voice bouncing around the stone walls as if the rocks themselves were shocked by the news, What…? What…? What…? It was not because he couldn't understand her, but because it seemed totally impossible. Too wonderful to be true. 

"You want to get out, don't you?" Swallow said peevishly, "you'll never be able to do it with stubbornness and brute strength alone. This requires strategy." 

"I…but it's so big. It'll take you twenty years at least!" 

"Don't be ridiculous, I'm not filling up the whole thing," the swallow snapped, "I'll just fill it half way and you can jump the rest. So don't you dare get fat and complacent, because once the ten years are up, I won't add a single twig more! I won't have a lazy frog for a husband, you hear me? So you better work hard!"

----------------

"I have something to confess," Liu Bang murmured with down-cast eyes, he shifted closer until they were sitting knee to knee. This was a baited hook if there ever was one, but Lü Zhi was in a biting mood.

"What is it?" she huffed, turning away from the mirror with a regal air.

Liu Bang grinned like a fox with a stolen egg, "…you'll have to reach inside my shirt."

"Why, you--!" Lü Zhi hissed indignantly. This dirty old man enjoyed playing his obscene games, twisting the natural roles of men and women so that she was the pursuer instead of a passive object of his affections, as was the proper way of things.

"What?" Liu Bang cried, all injured innocence which fooled Lü Zhi not at all. "It's just my chest! There's nothing untoward about it at all. The only thing you'll find in there is my loyal, beating heart."

Loyal. That was probably meant to flatter her. But all Lü Zhi could think about was that Cao woman in the house down the street and the bastards Liu Bang had fathered with her. The only thing that stopped him taking her as a concubine was because he couldn't afford it, and now that was going to change. Fresh from his successful peasant rebellion, Old Liu's star was on the rise. The higher he climbed, the more precarious her position became. Just the thought of it made her burn with hatred, like someone was pouring molten lead down her throat.

She made Liu Bang. It was her family's silver. Her tireless work. When he gate-crashed her father's party twenty years ago, he'd been nothing but a peasant with a brilliant smile and snowflakes in his hair. A lump of raw clay, waiting for a pair of hands. A frog squatting in the bottom of his well, convinced that he had seen all the world had to offer.

Before twenty-seven-year-old Liu Erlang met fifteen-year-old Lü Guniang, he had been coasting along on dumb luck and bullheadedness. Couldn't learn his letters. Couldn't hold down a job. A lovable rogue on the fast track to becoming just another drunken street-swindler once old age and hard living caught up with him. She saved him from that fate. Taught him discipline, tact and subterfuge. Filled him with a desperate hunger that had him pacing the streets from dawn till dusk, searching for something that was too big for Pei County to give him.

Those had been the best years of her life. She pushed him to take higher and higher offices, taught him how to pull the right strings, grease the right palms. Watched him basking in that glory, racing through life with the wind in his hair. She was the silent, swelling tide, raising her prized treasure-ship higher and higher, carrying him over treacherous rocks, skirting ferocious whirlpools and out-running ravenous beasts. The political climate had been inhospitable, but where others perished in grand, hubristic explosions, or withered away in the fog of mediocrity, the two of them were riding high after high. Unstoppable. Inseparable.

But of course, the good times couldn't last forever. Heaven's favor proved to be as capricious as the four winds. First she lost her youth, then her beauty, and finally her husband's favor, having failed to birth anything except daughters. His career slowed, and then stalled. By then, Liu Bang was middle-aged and had given up on becoming anything more than a small-town sheriff. He became depressed and complacent, falling into the embrace of his wine-cup and mistress every night. She was the one dragging him along with nothing but spite, willpower and sunk-cost fallacy. She kept an iron grip on their finances, watched out for new opportunities and sent timely gifts to his colleagues, biding their time, building up a storehouse of favours to call on.

She had walked across knives and fire for him, and what did she get in return? A rival on the verge of usurping her position as main wife. Extra mouths to gobble the food that rightly belonged to her legitimate children. A man's loyalty was different from a woman's loyalty.

Lü Zhi grabbed a fistful of Liu Bang's coat and wrenched it open. There was a loud ripping sound as the side tie of Liu Bang's coat gave out--another thing for her to mend that later--and his right lapel came undone in her hand. She had managed to pull it completely out of his belt--no small feat, considering how much his gut had grown over the years. Part of his undershirt had gone with it too, so now his clothes were hanging slightly open. There was a moment of absolute stillness as the two of them stared down mutely at her handiwork. It was actually a rather modest exposure, nothing a few hours of walking couldn't also accomplish. She was a married woman, anything a man had that was worth seeing, she had already seen. Plenty of farmers went shirtless in the summertime. The effect was singular because this had been forceful. Against his will, following her will. Lü Zhi could not seem to tear her eyes away from the length of Liu Bang's sunburned neck and the sliver of bare chest she had exposed, milk-white and vulnerable.

Liu Bang laughed breathlessly, "have I really been away so long?" He tried to play it off manfully, but his eyes were wide and hungry. Lu Zhi's stomach gave a swoop. This was the middle of the day. Guests would be arriving soon. It felt more obscene than seeing him fully naked.

Liu Bang took her hand slowly and guided it into his clothes. Her husband's skin was shockingly hot, his chest rose and fell rapidly under her hands. Her fingers traced the dip in his muscular chest, the sparse, wiry hairs, and finally closed upon a small, brocaded pouch.

She made every item her husband wore, this was not one of hers. When she opened the drawstring, two pieces of broken hairpin fell into her lap. It was one of the ivory pieces that came with her dowry. She had put this one in his hair the morning after he had taken her maidenhead. The pieces were as warm as his skin.

'At least he hadn't sold it to buy that flashy jade pendant,' She thought coldly.

"I didn't want to tell you about it." Liu Bang whispered, "because I knew how much it would upset you. I had a whole story planned while I was traveling here; how I got attacked by three hundred fierce brigands; how I was accosted by a penniless grandmother and her starving, orphaned grandchildren. But the truth is, I broke it because I was stupid and careless. That's it. I have no excuse."

Liu Bang stared into her face with a pathetic air. Lü Zhi gave him absolutely nothing. Liu Bang used his words to ensnare. Lü Zhi could flay people alive with her silences. They were equally matched in that regard.

"I carried the pieces with me, wondering what I was going to do." Liu Bang continued, "First, I kept it in my pocket, but I was afraid someone might steal it. Then I held it in my hand, but I was afraid I might drop it. Finally, I put it in a pouch and wore it around my neck. I wanted to take it back to you, so we can keep one half each. We're like the two pieces of this hairpin, even if we're separated, we still belong together. Wife, if you're mad at your useless husband, you should let it out. Yell and hit me if you want, but please don't hold it in. It's bad for your health."

"And let you play the victim? I don't think so. You don't deserve such easy absolution." In spite of it all, she was starting to soften. She folded the broken shaft into her handkerchief, and Liu Bang took the flowery decoration. If she ever got angry enough, she could at least stab him with it. "Is that all? Do you really expect me to believe this piece of junk was eating you up inside?"

"You're so cruel to this poor husband. He bares his soul to you and you mock his pain."

Lü Zhi picked up her lip-paper and made a show of applying rouge to her mouth, "Get on with it."

"A strange thing happened to me on the road. I dug this jade pendant out of the ground and Zhang Liang had some very cryptic things to say about it."

An auspicious jade piece and words from the genius strategist. Liu Bang had her full attention. She looked at him sharply from the mirror, "what did he say?"

"Many strange things. I didn't understand it at the time--or rather, I wasn't ready to, but I think I get it now. Do you ever wonder why the rats in the storehouses grow fat but the ones in the sewers stay thin and wretched?"

"It’s clearly their environment."

"Yeah. At the end of the day, they're both rats. Nothing about their natures are different, they both have whiskers and tails. So what about people? Who among us are fattening up in the storehouses, and who are wallowing in shit? If we're all rats, what's to stop me from moving into the storehouse to become the biggest, fattest rat of them all?" Liu Bang leaned forwards, and whispered hotly into her ear, "I'm going to replace him."

Lü Zhi gave him a steady, calculating look. "You're not talking about Xiang Yu." The hegemon-king.

"No, I'm talking about him." Liu Bang answered, "Qin Shi Huang." The First Emperor of Qin. There was a galaxy's worth of difference between the two names. The little frog had just told her he wanted to turn into a dragon.

"This is the first time I've ever said these words out loud. Even to myself. I was afraid to take that leap because then it would be real, and I would have to do it." Liu Bang took her hands, "I know you think I bed other women because I don't cherish you anymore. That's not true. They mean nothing to me, I forget them the moment I leave their beds. You're the only one who's on my mind, day and night. Do you think I could trust any of those silly girls enough to tell them these things? Do you think any of them could ever hope to understand my ambitions? To be my wife?" 

Lu Zhi said nothing in reply, but when Liu Bang pressed himself against her and put his lips to her neck, she let him do it, "Well, what do you think, My Lady? I think Empress Lü has a nice ring to it."

Lu Zhi retracted her hands primly and took a deep breath, considering her words carefully, "the commoners already love you. It shouldn't be difficult to keep their support, all you need to do is stay humble and relatable. Remember, you're one of them; a man of the people, you understand their struggles and you have their best interests at heart. With the nobles, you must make them underestimate you. Play up the fact you're an uneducated peasant. Drink, whore and gamble. Be as reckless as possible without losing support. Xiang Yu is powerful and competent in his own right, he can pick and choose his followers so they're always uneasy around him. You have to poach his best men, make them believe you can't live without them, that you'll reward them handsomely when you come into power. This will attract opportunists who are as sly as yourself, people who will do anything it takes to win--they'll be treacherous, of course, but you can beat them with experience. They'll think you're just a charismatic face who is easy to manipulate, do not dissuade them of that."

Liu Bang nodded along eagerly, mouthing her words silently, like she was an oracle bone inscribed by Heaven's own hand. His admiration was a heady thing and Lu Zhi could hear a faint roaring in her ears, growing louder and louder with each passing moment. The wind was picking up. The tides were rising again.

Notes:

Liu Erlang: nickname "second son", lang is used to describe a handsome young man.

Lü Guniang: nickname "young lady". These nicknames combined lends a very ironic love story vibe.

tolkien once said allegory was stupid and a cowards way out. but tolkien's not here so LETS GO BABEY!!!! 

i wrote this enormous, rambling dissertation about liu bang and lu zhi's relationship, only to toss the whole thing out when i realised a dumb little fable would convey the whole thing 800 times better and 800 words shorter. 

this story draws inspiration from the myth jingwei fills the sea, where the creator-god nuwa drowns at sea and is reincarnated as a bird named jingwei, who dedicates her entire existence to filling the eastern sea. it fits lu zhi pretty well, since she is both a powerful force and a victim 

Liu Bang's brilliant hairpin splitting was stolen wholecloth from Bai Juyi's poem "the Song of Big Sad"

any story is a romantic love story if you pause it at the right time...

[nyxisart]

Alright here's the final update of the list!

I can't keep up with all the asks, like seriously I got more than I could actually answer... Thanks everyone for your participation, but from now on I'll stop answering asks on this subject, so please stop sending them

Cat girls x6 ✅

Puppy girls x8 / Puppy boy ✅

Crow girls/boys x2 ✅

Coyote girls x2 ✅

Ox Girls ✅

Slime girls x2 ✅

Bunny girls x3 / Bunny genderfluid / Bunny boy x2 ✅

Otter girls ✅

Fox/Kitsune girls x4 ✅

Raccoon girls ✅

Eldritch horror girls x4 ✅

Snake girls x4 ✅

Deer girls ✅

Fish girls :✅

Spider girls ✅

Wolf girls/Werewolf x6 ✅

Rat girls ✅

Raven girls ✅

Moth girls x2 ✅

Robot girls x6 ✅

Axolotl girls ✅

Manul girls ✅

Cow girls ✅

Alien girls ✅

Goat girls x3 ✅

Tanuki girls ✅

Chimera girls x2 ✅

Dragon girls/folks x4 ✅

Seal girls ✅

Succubus girls ✅

Demon girls ✅

Skunk girls ✅

Vrastelian girls ✅

Possum girls x3 ✅

Sheep girls x2 ✅

Plant/Lichen girls x3 :✅

Plushie girls ✅

Hyena girls x2 ✅

Shark girls x2 ✅

Fairy girls ✅

Owl girls x2 ✅

Bear girls ✅

Wolf-crow femboy ✅

Goddess ✅

Sloth girl ✅

Pangolin girls✅

Magical girls :✅

Ghost girls ✅

Snail girls ✅

Chinchilla girls ✅

Elephant girls ✅

Ant girls ✅

Whale girls ✅

Lynx girls ✅

Cockroach girls x2 ✅

Girl girls x4 ✅

Capybara girls ✅

Vampire girls ✅

Ferret girls x2 ✅

Raptor girls ✅

Worm girls ✅

Iguana girls ✅

Tiger girls ✅

Protogen girls ✅

Birb girls ✅