#qiongqi path 2.0

[admirableadmiranda]

After seeing a horribly misguided take on the ambush of Wei Wuxian at Qiongqi, can you explain for the class what a canon compliant reading of that moment is like? Because I think it's so easy for someone (like me) who has read the book after seeing the webseries adaptation to get things confused. (It's hard to forget your first and The Untamed was my introduction to the story.)

Thank you!

Of course! It’s not a scene I go over too often, but let’s see if I can break it down in a satisfying way.

The setting is perhaps a year after Wei Wuxian leaves to protect the Wens. They have all been living on Corpse Mountain, doing their best to avoid the jianghu’s rage and just keep living a day at a time. There is a fragile sort of hope blossoming in that it’s been almost a year and because Corpse Mountain and Yiling are kind of cut off from the jianghu that things might be getting better because they are still alive.

Wei Wuxian receives an invitation to a party for Jin Ling. I’m genuinely not certain which party as due to the Jin being the Jin, they are throwing a lot of parties for him. It’s usually referred to as his 100 day celebration, but I think in the book it’s a month after his birth. Unlike in cql, we have no idea who delivered this letter, but it is most certainly not from Lan Wangji as we would have known if he did.

For people who are living in fragile hope, it is a good sign! Wei Wuxian buys new robes in white(!) and makes an incredibly powerful gift that will essentially protect Jin Ling from all minor spiritual evils in his life. It is a gift people would kill to have. He sets out to go to Jinlintai with only Wen Ning at his side as a show of good faith and non-aggression, but not defenseless.

On their way to Jinlintai, they are stopped in Qiongqi Path when someone fires an arrow at Wei Wuxian that Wen Ning catches. Jin Zixun, Jin Zixuan’s less likeable toad of a cousin, comes out and tells Wei Wuxian that he’s surrounded by three hundred archers and demands for Wei Wuxian to remove a curse that he’s put on him.

Now we know later that it was actually Su She that cursed Jin Zixun for being an arrogant toe rag and that Jin Guangyao likely knew this as they were buddies at the time already, but he has told Jin Zixun that it was Wei Wuxian and due to the rumors flying around about him, he wholeheartedly believes it. He refuses to listen to Wei Wuxian and refuses to accept even the burden of proof in that Wei Wuxian has no markings of the backfire from such a powerful curse because obviously, being Wei Wuxian, he could just make them hit someone else, right?!

Jin Zixun is very much not a smart man. Anyway, Wei Wuxian is preparing to fight here because he’s been ambushed! And to add injury to insult, this is a planned ambush where they removed all of the bodies and anything that Wei Wuxian can influence with his guidao for at least ten miles. He literally only has Wen Ning here, his only line of defense against three hundred archers and an ambush based on lies. He removes a talisman that’s designed to help suppress Wen Ning’s rage as he’s going to need all the help he can get in this stacked fight looming in front of him.

Jin Zixuan, who has heard of his cousin taking three hundred archers and going out to ambush Wei Wuxian, who he has invited to Jin Ling’s party from Jin Guangyao (none of these facts are in fact a coincidence), shows up now. To our great and unyielding disappointment, despite this clearly being an ambush on a man he invited as his guest and Wei Wuxian and Wen Ning being two people against an army of three hundred, takes his cousin’s side. He demands for Wei Wuxian to stand down, he tells him that he’ll be tried at Jinlintai and basically ignores everything about the situation that points out that his family may not be in the right on this. Jin Zixun crushes the bell that was meant to be a present for Jin Ling beneath his foot.

At some point while he and Wei Wuxian are arguing, he draws his sword and starts to lunge at Wei Wuxian, a war veteran. Faced with sudden, escalating hostility, Wei Wuxian reacts on instinct and commands Wen Ning to stop Jin Zixuan from attacking him. Wen Ning does. Fatally.

Now this is not what Wei Wuxian wanted at all and it is a loss of control, but also how many stories have we heard in real life about people with strong triggers associated with being attacked having someone approach them in an obviously aggressive way and react on instinct? Wei Wuxian had no reason to believe that Jin Zixuan wasn’t a part of this whole mess from the beginning, and while later clarity of mind and Jin Zixuan’s last words give him some indication that it wasn’t planned, at that very moment he was reacting to an escalating threat.

The real loss of control comes when he sees what has happened, Jin Zixuan dying on Wen Ning’s arm in front of everyone. After a year of living and waiting for the hammer to fall, that cautious hope that an invitation to his shijie’s son’s month birthday party might mean that they’re not inevitably doomed and then the utter betrayal of the ambush and Jin Zixuan’s actions, he loses control and Wen Ning kills everyone in Qiongqi Path before carrying a nigh-catatonic Wei Wuxian back to the safety of Corpse Mountain.

It is a tragedy in all senses of the word. It gives the Jin exactly what they need to rile up dissent against Wei Wuxian into actual action. It gives them a concrete action to point too. Jin Zixuan’s invitation to Wei Wuxian was well known, so it wrecks what remains of his reputation and at this point no matter what Wei Wuxian or anyone else does, the people living in Corpse Mountain are doomed.

Qiongqi Path 2.0 is basically the ultimate machination of the Jin and the collapse of what little stability Wei Wuxian had left in his first life. Less than a week after this, Wen Qing will be dead and Wen Ning heavily implied to be manipulated into killing the Nie and Lan cultivators who came to see their executions; when they were promised by Jin Guangshan that if they turned themselves in, he and the others would leave the people on corpse mountain alone. What with the two clans that didn’t have an active vendetta against Wei Wuxian now dragged in by Wen Ning’s murder, it will be easy for the Jin to rally them into an army against Wei Wuxian at Nightless City and spark the final chain of events that leads to the end of Wei Wuxian’s first life.

Wei Wuxian is culpable in the extent that he lost control and killed everyone there. But given the factors in play, he is certainly not an unreasonable aggressor or reacting without cause to anything that’s going on.

Jin Zixuan has never been kind or reasonable to him once whenever they’ve met in person. As a teenager he disparages Jiang Yanli in front of him multiple times and Wei Wuxian is honorbound to defend her from the societal impact of Jin Zixuan’s careless words. As adults, Jin Zixuan tells Jiang Cheng to control his servant in Wei Wuxian’s face when he continues to defend Jiang Yanli from a man who has at that point still shown her no respect or care in the slightest. They have a terrible relationship and one that while equally hostile from both ends, is more built off of Jin Zixuan’s actions than Wei Wuxian’s. We can even see that in the Xuanwu Cave that Wei Wuxian admires his willingness to stand up for Mianmian when the Wen are going for her.

The fact of the matter is, is that Jin Zixuan had a history of deliberately antagonizing Wei Wuxian and also taking his first interpretation of a series of events as truth and refusing to listen to contradictory evidence. He gets away with it for a number of years due to his prestige and position, but eventually he takes that childish attitude onto a battlefront, and it gets him killed.

There may be no second flute user at Qiongqi Path in the book and the blood is on Wei Wuxian’s hands. But to claim that it is his fault and that he was responsible for things going wrong is a very bad take indeed.

A canon compliant take on Qiongqi Path is that it is the ultimate chess move of the Jin against him, where in the end Jin Guangyao sacrifices a rook and takes Wei Wuxian’s last defending pieces before using him as the utter scapegoat of the jianghu in his and the Jin Clan’s rise to power. And also a reminder that if you continue to push people to their limits and treat them badly constantly, eventually they will have nothing left in which to treat you well.

I hope this helps!

[cum-villain]

to skip this episode and save my tears or go forth and cry a lot

[twilightarc-gm]

We learn at Qiongqi path 2.0 that Wen Ning has to remove some suppression talismans for him to go full berserk mode. More than likely, in the process of taking him in to burn or trying to burn him, some of the suppression talismans were damaged or removed and it caused the attack.

Perfect opportunity for LLJ to take him away and secure him while claiming he's been burned to ashes.

ok questions gang. novelverse specifically:

[the-social-recluse]

JGY gets rid of people slowly. Meaning in case he would ever want to kill JZX, he would have made it known to him too. 

[scarletjedi]

I posted 711 times in 2021

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#it all started when i tried and failed to update the os but i'm not playing with that shit until after i'm done for the semester.

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

untitled Untamed time travel au, but make it Mingcheng

@piyo-13

Part 1: The set up

EDIT: Part 2A is up! Link at the bottom!

Okay, so, like I said. Mingcheng. Time travel. Fix-it.

(this is mostly a daydream and less a fic idea in and of itself, so I keep picturing it as a sequel to either Bilateral or shamelesscooper’s stuff - which I think this’ll be. a Spiritual successor)

So. Established Mingcheng as an ongoing, romantic relationship where they both understand that they’re building a relationship, not just a fling. We get A JC who, “canonically” can give NMJ a run for his money while sparring, and will *wear him out* in the bedroom. Like, I write smut, I think this is a *key element* in a top-tier Mingcheng fic (if they aren’t being written as asexual, naturally) and I think this dynamic just ADDS to JC’s budding reputation as a *stone cold badass.*

So, either way, you’ve read it. You know where they are.

To add a bit of angst for spice... Events play out as in canon, up through NMJ’s death. (I don’t think this is where established Mingcheng should go, btw - I think them being together changes events for the better and a lot of that shit is avoided). Broken hearted AGAIN (because lbr, NMJ was there for JC when his world fell apart. Probably even fought a bit - I needed your support! etc...) JC is visited by NHS.

He’s... different than JC remembered. Colder. Distant, but what was ditzy before is now aloof. Like he’s looking into you rather than through you. Nie Huaisang says.

“Jiang-xiong...did you love my brother?”

JC is incensed. How could NHS doubt his love? *JC* is not the one who leaves.

“Jin Guangyao killed him.” It’s the only time NHS says it out loud. “He sent Jin Zixuan to his death at Qiongqi path. He had his accomplice tamper with Wei Wuxian’s music, leading to—”

“Enough,” JC cuts him off. “So you want me to kill him for you?”

“No,” NHS said. “I want him unmade.”

Which - TIME TRAVEL MAGIC BA BOW

NHS sends JC back, but....I think I need something to go wrong. For reasons they use Baxia in the ritual, and NHS is adopting a ritual to send the self back to send JC back, but....

He gets it wrong and sends JC back IN ADDITION to himself

Baxia sends back NMJ

JC’s core sends back WWX

....handwavy some reason I want LWJ to be sent back as well

...and Wen Ning because he’s also tied to WWX and he’s alive but he keeps his ghost powers, I’ll explain later but it’s cool

...to the night before they start at Cloud Recesses

JC is like “alright! It worked! I have NHS’s plan. I rebuilt a sect before so I can totally do this!” ....but then WWX falls out of bed, freaking out and clutching his lower dantain, sobbing and freaking out- (because he’s a: suddenly very alive when he was dead and b: in possession of his golden core. It’s a bit disorienting) and JC is staring at him like: ...wtf? It wouldn’t be the first time WWX had nightmares, but they were about dogs- not whatever this is.

Anyway, then WWX sees JC, and JC can *see* the moment of fear (and that hurts because this WWX should not be afraid of him) and the mask fall and—

Look, JC isn’t stupid. He just time traveled. That look is what he had seen *after sunshot* so—

“What’s the last thing you remember?” JC asks, and the blank look on WWX’s face is *terrible*

“Ahaha...Jiang Cheng, what—“

“It’s nightless city, isn’t it?” (Going with untamed canon).

WWX‘a eyes get big, “Shijie!” And he twists like he’s going to up ans run to her—

“She’s asleep!” JC snapps. “You’ll see her in the morning.”

WWX blinks at him “will I still be here in the morning?”

“Unless NHS really fucked up, we both will be.”

“... What does Huaisang have to do with this?”

“He’s the one that sent me back,” JC said, and cocked his head. “I have no idea why you’re here too.”

And look - WWX isn’t going crazy from resentful energy, but he’s also a traumatized man. He’s thinking clearly but everything is closer to the surface- he flinches. JC knows that flinch- that guilty flinch that says WWX knows but doesn’t want to say.

“Wei Wuxian!”

And now he flinches, but when JC doesn’t lunge for him, WWX looks at him assessingly. “Why aren’t you trying to kill me again?”

“I wasn’t trying to kill you then! I never thought you’d—“ not survive that fall. “Do you know the last thing I remember? What made me agree to come back? Everyone was dead, JGS was insisting on JL spending more time at Koi Tower, and my lover was murdered- murdered by the same man who sent JZX to his death and set you up for his murder, and made you lose control at Nightless city, and a-jie--”

“You had a lover?!”

“Not the point!”

“Who was it? Do I know her?”

“I’m not telling you!”

“Tell me and I’ll tell you why I think I came back too”

“Fine. On three.”

“Fine.”

“One. Two. Three: Nie Mingjue”

“I gave you my core. What do you mean Nie Mingjue?!”

“GAVE ME YOUR WHAT?!”

"Well it's not like you still have it!"

there’s more shouting (with both of them thinking their grievance is more important), and WWX explains and JC rages and lets slip that “what’s the point of distracting the guards if you just throw it away?!” “...what guards? Jiang Cheng you better not mean what I think you mean!” “Or fucking what?!” Eventually, both of them crying, they hug it out. WWX offers to let JC disown him and JC is like “that’s what got us into this mess to begin with. You’re my brother. You’re stuck with me.” And is honestly surprised when WWX is ecstatic.

The next morning Yanli is like “are you okay? There was shouting?”

But they’re like “we’re cool”

Next time: Cloud Recesses and the one braincell trio plan a war

65 notes • Posted 2021-05-11 03:56:12 GMT

#4

*shakes magic 8 ball* yeah, I have a headache and when I try to focus, I fall asleep. Whatchoo got for me?

*Magic 8 ball* please stop, we’ve talked about this....

90 notes • Posted 2021-04-03 21:31:12 GMT

#3

OKAY LIL NAS X COVERED JOLINE AND IT IS LEGIT FIRE!

110 notes • Posted 2021-09-22 04:13:10 GMT

#2

My favorite thing about the children’s hospital/color theory jokes is that they have the same energy as mistyping something in the group chat— and no one on this site will let them forget it

122 notes • Posted 2021-09-19 00:47:07 GMT

#1

okay, but now I don’t know what I want more: 

Din running away from a battle, carrying Grogu under one arm and Luke over his shoulder while he deflects incoming fire with his lightsaber, or...

Luke running, carrying Din over his shoulder, shooting at their enemy, Grogu laughing as he’s bouncing along, carried by the Force.

122 notes • Posted 2021-02-06 04:24:55 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

[admirableadmiranda]

So there’s probably a timespan of no more than a year between when Wei Wuxian breaks the Wens out of the prison camp and Qiongqi Path 2.0, because mob energy does not exactly last forever without a target to point it to and a target that’s doing nothing hiding away on a corpse ridden mountain is not exactly a dangerous threat by itself. But usually the biggest debate I see against this is that people insist that there has to be at least 2-3 years where they’re up there with nothing happening and MXTX just can’t do math on the kids because of how theoretically long Jiang Yanli and Jin Zixuan would have needed to be engaged, married and have a baby. Except that there’s a very easy answer to that, which is that Jiang Yanli gets pregnant before they’re married and they rush the wedding.

Ergo shotgun wedding combined with lunar new year age count and all the ages fall into place including Sizhui’s.

Hold up, wait a minute: if Jin Ling, who was an infant when the first siege happened, is “almost 16” (taming wangxian) 13 years later when Wei Wuxian resurrects, and Wei Wuxian and co were 15/16 when the Cloud Recesses schooling happens, then were the adults actually a lot younger than we typically consider them when they experienced all the horrors of the Wen indoctrination camp, the Xuanwu of Slaughter, and the Sunshot Campaign????

[admirableadmiranda]

Hello! How are you feeling? How's life training you?

I have come with another question, if you're up to it. (I'm sorry if I'm asking a bit too many questions.)

I read a fic yesterday that stated that Wei Wuxian caused thousands of souls from entering the rebirth cycle. That he killed souls indiscriminately. My assumption is that they took an accusation from The Untamed (fic was based on the live action) as fact. But is there any indication that any of the spirits or corpses used by Wei Wuxian were unable to reincarnate or not put to rest once he was done?

Hello! I’m doing okay, I’m getting over a cold, my tumblr inbox is suffering because life has been too busy for essay long questions but I promise I’ll get there eventually. I have a week coming up in March where I’ll just be at home on recovery so plenty of time will be there then!!

This one on the other hand (as long as you don’t mind me skipping the breakdown of souls in Chinese beliefs again) is pretty short.

So Wei Wuxian isn’t manipulating anything that wasn’t already trapped on earth to begin with. The part of the soul most needed to reincarnate dies and goes into the afterlife when the person does, and the leftover bits join them when the body is buried. This is why burial rites are really important and most all of our resentful spirits/corpses we see usually weren’t buried. That in and of itself makes an unhappy spirit that can’t move on and if given enough time, even burying it won’t help without additional work to deal with their spirit.

Wei Wuxian, contrary to popular belief (and I don’t even know if it’s a CQL error or people making shit up and using stuff in CQL to justify it) isn’t trapping anyone on earth. He’s actually helping get rid of the lingering resentful souls and stuff that’s busy being angry at still being in the world with his cultivation; spending time with dead flower girls who want to pass on their knowledge and enjoy being alive a little longer, helping souls who died violently get revenge on their killers so they can be at peace, letting them fulfill last wishes just as A-Qing keeping people out of Yi City and wanting Xue Yang dead was hers (even if she was cruelly shattered before he could finish the task). His guidao tends to be a net positive wherever he goes because he is working with the existing misery in the area and getting rid of it.

This is why in the war he had to make angry spirits by digging up bodies and aggravating them enough to create his army before people started dying. This is why in Qiongqi Path 2.0 Jin Zixun has his men remove every corpse or dead thing in miles so that Wei Wuxian is crippled. If there’s nothing there to work with, then he can’t cultivate. He can’t create resentment that doesn’t already exist.

Even in Wen Ning’s case, what he has done is bind his living soul to his dead body, but Wen Ning can still die again when he’s ready. Wen Ning is still around because Wen Ning isn’t ready to go. Wen Ning wants to live more, he’ll pass on when he’s ready.

So really anything about him ruining souls for reincarnation or pulling them out of the cycle is a load of bullshit usually based off of a complete lack of knowledge of how Chinese souls and ghosts work in general and then used to blame him for being who he is (and also usually used to exonerate villains I’m sure you’ve seen too)

Hope that helps!

[the-social-recluse]

Jin banquet/Qiongqi Path 1.0: YL!WWX does the right thing, society condemns him for it.

Qiongqi Path 2.0/Nightless City: YL!WWX is forced to do the wrong thing, society condemns him for it.

[the-social-recluse]

Arrows

MuXi Cave - gets accidentally shot at, removes the arrow and tosses it aside;

Qiongqi Path 2.0 - shot at but arrow is caught by WN, dispels the rest;

Nightless City - shot at, removes the arrow aiming back at attacker, killing him.

[katt5673]

#GOD I JUST#I know we like to really flatten the nuance out of the Dafan Wen discourse so it’s black and white#but you know who doesn’t? Wen Qing#she’s a running a fucking supervisory office in occupied territory#during her family’s sect’s bloodthirsty war of conquest#she certainly never forgets this fact and I don’t think she expects anyone else to either#can she stop Wen Ruohan? probably not#does she share culpability? probably yeah#this isn’t a ‘gotcha’ moment for her#she’s taking ownership of what her family did to his#before she goes to make it up the only way she can#(this reminds me a lot of WWX#saying even if there was a second flautist at Qiongqi path/Nightless city 2.0#he still feels responsible for his part in all the death and horror#because he did still have plenty of responsibility!#I would love him less without that willingness to own his mistakes#and I would love wen qing less is she wasn’t willing to accept blame for her part in her family’s war#god what a pair#I adore them#no wonder they’re best friends)#my favorite untamed duet#wen qing#wei wuxian#the untamed 

@cerusee

《陈情令》 Chén Qíng Lìng (2019) Ep. 17 ⨳ 温情 Wen Qing & 魏无羡 Wei Wuxian

[the-social-recluse]

EP. 21: JYL GETS MARRIED! YILING WANGXIAN DATE!! WN GETS HIS CONSCIOUSNESS BACK (then and now)!!!

EP. 21:

EP. 21:

EP. 21: oh and Qiongqi Path 2.0 happens too 🙄

[the-social-recluse]

Qiongqi Path 2.0 happened because everyone’s heard what YL!WWX had to say... only to do the direct opposite of that 🙃