#nhs got to kill jgy at first try that's a bitch i respect

[theballadofmars]

I've been working as a waiter for less than a month and I went from "I love jin guangyao but he did commit many crimes and has to pay the consequences" to "tbh he deserves to kill some people".

I'm not even having such a bad time, but when I have a bad customer or a rude one and I have to act nice and smile at them oh boy, I get it.

I even respect him even more because after all the public service job he had to do when he got into a position of power he changed the system to help the lower class (creating the towers). If he got to kill some rich assholes in his way that's on them. Next time be nicer to workers because you never know if one of them is planning a revolt (actually just be nice to workers in general).

[adhd-wifi]

MDZS Cultivational Sects & Daoist Elements (WuXing)

So I was entertaining a new AU idea (which I will share in a bit maybe), and then I realized just how prevalent the Daoist philosophies are in the story. In fact, the Five Major Cultivation Sects directly represent each of the Five Elements - WuXing (五行) - consisting of Water (水), Wood (木), Fire (火), Earth (土), and Metal (金). (Side note, the cycle actually starts from Wood, but I started with Water since that’s the Jiang Sect.)

Full disclaimer, while I am Chinese and have knowledge of this, I grew up in Singapore with primarily Buddhist beliefs (though I’ve basically been agnostic my whole life), so some of what I say here might be inaccurate, and please feel free to correct me if I’m wrong. 

Also...if everyone already knew this and I didn’t notice, just take this as my usual ramblings LMAO

That aside, here are the explanations! Warning: Spoilers!

Yunmeng Jiang Sect（云梦江氏）= Water (水)

The 江 (jiāng) character uses the (氵) radical, which is derived from (水)

Their home is Lotus Pier, surrounded by waters all around

The Water Element is technically the last in the cycle and seen as the lowest due to it being more associated with the negative “Yin (阴)” than any other element, and (at least) after Lotus Pier was destroyed, it did become the weakest sect of the five, story-wise

The Water Element is seen as virtuous, with manifests as both gentle tranquility (JFM, JYL) and fierce force (JC, YZY). WWX himself is both gentle and fierce. 

Its main negative traits are fear, anxiety and indecision, and also difficulty in choosing more than one side to stick to (reflective of JC and WWX’s fight which led to WWX leaving the Jiang Sect after siding with the Wen Remnants)

Said to be the easiest element to go into a downward spiral in life, which fits the Fall of Lotus Pier, the declining relationship between the Jiang siblings (especially after JYL’s death), and WWX’s descent into demonic cultivation

Gusu Lan Sect（姑苏蓝氏）= Wood (木)

The 蓝 (lán) character uses the (艹) radical, derived from (草 - grass)

Also, 蓝 means “blue”, and blue is one of the main colours representing the Wood Element

While the Cloud Recesses primarily use sky/cloud motifs, it is located in a forested mountain away from most human influence

More in tune with nature than all the other sects, and is mostly vegetarian

The Wood Element is seen as righteous, noble, and patience, and it is seen as the first and highest in the cycle with having the most association to the positive “Yang (阳)”

It’s also the element that promotes self-growth the most, which you could say represents the Twin Jades of Lan the most out of the cast, as LWJ and LXC have had their ideals challenged the most throughout the course of the story, primarily due to WWX and JGY respectively

The primary negative trait of the Wood Element is stubborn anger, which is most evident in LWJ, but also LQR, and overall through the extremely strict (to the point of almost delusional self-righteousness) ideals of conformity and “punishment” of the Lan sect as a whole

QiShan Wen Sect（岐山温氏）= Fire (火)

The 温 (wēn) character means “warmth”, clearly associated with fire and the sun, the Wen Sect’s motif

Red is, unsurprisingly, the primary colour representing the Fire Element

I am struggling to not make SEVERAL Avatar: The Last Airbender jokes here because so much of it is literally just the Fire Nation

The Fire Element is strongly associated with prosperity, intensity, and strength, which ties in with the Wen Sect initially being the most powerful sect

Its primary negative traits are aggression and hatred, which fits the tyrannical nature of the Wen Sect as a whole in the beginning of the story, which led to the blind hatred of anyone named Wen following the Sunshot Campaign

However, it also has a much more honourable side of bravery and bringing warmth, which ties in with WQ and WN committing treason and housing the Jiang siblings during the war, then the Wen Remnants bringing warmth to the Burial Mounds while living there with WWX, giving him a family

Qinghe Nie Sect（清河聂氏）= Earth (土)

The Nie Sect is the only one out of the Five Sects without anything in its name linking it to the Earth element

However, the Unclean Realm is shown to be desolate place, almost entirely free of plants and waters, instead surrounded by stone and earth

Even their ancestral hall for putting the violent Blade Spirits to rest is simply know as the Stone Castles 

The Earth Element is considered the most “balanced” of the five, seen as equal parts “Yin (阴)” & “Yang (阳)”, and as such, is seen as the most harmonious of the elements which seeks peace

This ties into the fact that it was ultimately NHS’s secretive actions that led to the end of the main conflict of the story, out love for his brother and desire to avenge him

Expanding on NMJ and NHS, they are two complete opposites in terms of personality, NMJ taking on the more reckless & headstrong traits of the element, while NHS takes on the more cautious & quiet traits, the two of them reflecting the two extremes of the element

The Earth element is also seen as STRONGLY family oriented, which also ties into the Nie brothers' harmony, since they genuinely loved each other almost unproblematically despite their differences (compared to literally every other family in the story I’M JUST SAYING)

One of my favourite traits of the Earth Element in relation to the Nie brothers is “tolerance”, because while on the surface it seemed that NMJ was the less tolerant one of the two, he let Meng Yao get away with a lot, leading to his own death, and then NHS ends up being far more cruel and ruthless than anyone expected from him because of how much he COULDN’T tolerate his brother’s murderer’s existence, going as far as to literally destroy his reputation as much as he could before letting the man die

Honestly the Nie Sect and the Earth Element are the most interesting ones out of all of them to me I could talk about this for a long time lol

Lanling Jin Sect（兰陵金氏）= Metal (金)

It’s literally the same character. 金 (jīn), meaning gold, is also the character for “metal” in WuXing because gold is seen as the most precious metal

The Metal Element, unsurprisingly, symbolises wealth, ambition, persistence, and firm strength. Given the Jin Sect being as grand and proud as it is, it fits painfully well

Also, since all the Jin Sect members seem to have a pride problem, it ties into the Metal Element’s negative traits of judgement of others, being controlling, and arrogance

Out of all the sects, the Jin Sect takes on the most negative traits of their element, though most of it is through JGS and JGY

JGS’s constant desire for power is blatantly shown throughout his entire existence within the story, and with JGY he showed the traits of being cunning and possessing good foresight in his plans to seize power

On the more positive side, JZX displayed the most notable positive trait of the Metal Element, which is courage, such as when he defended MianMian, when he confessed to JYL at the cost of his pride, and then when he went to QiongQi Pass alone to try and stop his bitch ass cousin from killing WWX

Other Notes:

WWX, the lowest and most “Yin (阴)” of the Sects (Jiang/Water), is directly opposite of LWJ’s sect (Lan/Wood), the highest and most “Yang (阳)”, but also right next to each other in the cycle as a result

In the elemental “generating” cycle, Wood generates or feeds Fire. In the “controlling” cycle, Water douses Fire. In MDZS, the Lan Sect falling to the Wen Sect started the Wen indoctrination, and the fall of Lotus Pier led to the start of the Sunshot Campaign

The Fire Element “controls” the Metal Element, so with the Wen Sect gone, the Jin Sect had no opposition with rising to power because all the other Sects/Elements still had their “controlling” element present

The Nie Sect is the least obvious in its elemental representation, while the Jin Sect is the most obvious. I like to take this as the Jin Sect being flashy about their power while never noticing the threat of the Nie Sect right under their noses (Perish, JGY)

Welp, that’s all I have for now. Please, if I got something wrong please let me know, because as you can see, I am now quite invested in looking into the symbolism even more.