#tgcf vol 4 spoilers

[kit-o-nine-tales]

the LOVE that i have for this walking fist-fight

[wayward-inspiration]

"There was only a small bit of haunting ghost fire, blazing unceasingly as it flitted about." 天官赐福

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Lineart

Book 4 is hauntingly tragic

[yumaisbored]

Hua Cheng as Lang Ying bolting out of the room when he walked in on Xie Lian shirtless/bathing and immediately coming back to drag Quan Yizhen (fully asleep) outside and then for good measure dumping a pile of clothes over his head (still fully asleep) will never not be peak comedy

[just-a-little-kreature]

volume 4 content cause my sibling finally read it!!!!

[lurkinginnernarrator]

“You ask who I am?! Listen well! I am His Eminent Highness the Crown Prince! Bow down before me, you riotous, unruly horde!”

His voice boomed like a bolt from the blue. There were actually a few who dropped to their knees and didn’t snap out of it until their companions pulled them up.

“What are you doing? Are you actually kneeling?” “Th-that’s weird, I did it before I realized…”

Xie Lian continued in a sharp tone. “I am over eight hundred years old. Older than all of you combined! I have crossed more bridges than all the roads you have walked! “I possess shrines and temples across this land! My worship has spread to the four seas! If you do not know my name, it is because you are uneducated and ignorant of the world!

“I do not worship gods—

“I am God!"

dumbstruck, legitimately.

[trans-hua-cheng-agenda]

Tgcf spoilers //

Ohhhhhhhh so that’s why he can’t die

Hey Jun Wu? I just wanna talk

[butjesswhy]

"you called for the wrong person"

[whimlen]

finishing volume 4 of tgcf after almost a year of reblogging beefleaf art has me feeling like

[weirdcat1213]

I have many questions and theories about xie lian my poor little wet cat with bad luck but i need to know how his perspective on godness (? sorry) has changed

we know what he did when he was young and naive and thought he could help people in impossible ways but...what would he do now in that situation? if he was powerful again and there was a similar situation...what will he do?

[kit-o-nine-tales]

Xie Lian is really running on the Galaxy Brain OS bc like, it’s the second time im readin the part where he tricks Ling Wen abt the brocade immortal and im just like….

How??!! Dude, how did u even think of all these layers of misdirection?!!

taizi dianxia really is built different fhehrvrufyjy

[wayward-inspiration]

"The dark blade coursed with chilling light. Xie Lian's fear soared to it's peak." 天官赐福

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10 of Swords: painful endings, deep wounds, betrayal, loss, crisis

Lined ver.

[yumaisbored]

if you ever feel useless, just remember the time Pei Ming 'labored tirelessly all night' on a beach diligently hand-building those coffins

[princessofxianle]

Jaw on the floor...

...I love him

Mans been waiting 800 years to go off like that

[lurkinginnernarrator]

rip yin yu he gives me wen ning vibes

bro had to catch all the brocade immortal peddlers just because hua cheng 'didnt want to inconvenience gege' or some shit like that

guys help me I'm reading volume four of TGCF

I am not ready

[aroacedm]

here’s 12 pictures of my art! context after each and my references at the end

tgcf spoilers!

12th

redrawing of the official art from tgcf volume 4! shi qingxuan is my favourite character and he xuan is a close second

this took me a while until i liked it but i wanted to recreate how the original created the ominous feeling and had so much detail and contrast while being in greyscale

11th

from the tgcf manhua, fengqing! i think their my favourite ship, and i hadn’t drawn them before so i tried to give it a go. not a big fan of the proportions but i think it turned out ok.

10th

@oceantherat (this is their favourite character from rain code) showed me the reference picture and i decided to try drawing it as perspective practice. it ended up a little bigger than i though so i couldn’t fit the whole reference, and the mask doesn’t feel rounded, but overall i like it

9th

same guy again! i wanted to try drawing him again but i think the shadows got a bit messed up. my cheap pens smudged a bit but overall i like it

8th

also from the tgcf manhua, this was from a meme that’s become an bit with me and ocean, just felt like drawing something and saw this in my photos

7th

after a dnd session with ocean and some other friends, i drew a scene from ocean’s character’s (also called ocean because that’s not their irl name) flashback! this guy killed her family! he’s one of her relatives! but i really wanted to focus on how dark the scene was, with almost everything being pitch black. i wanted to recreate the scene that left my players going D:

6th

here’s a younger ocean and her cousin that’s more like a brother! i hope nothing bad happens to him… i wanted to draw a picture that helped me as a reference for the backstory, to help build the character relationships and motivations

5th

it’s another character from that dnd campaign when they were younger with their brother figure! except this one is an NPC helping them out! i wanted to try and make the effect of torn paper but didn’t want to risk anything, so i left a bit of uncoloured paper to imitate a layer of partially torn paper. this was also to help when i was writing backstories

4th

this is the npc from the last picture in present time, i wanted to make canon designs for all the characters to help me visualise everything. i hid a few lore elements in this but because ocean is going to see this i can’t explain

3rd

i tried to redraw a picture of me and a friend on a ride together but in a more simple style (no eyes and mouth, ect) i haven’t shown the friend yet but i will soon. i’m the person looking at the camera. i really loved the photo and wanted to try drawing it

2nd

i drew this a while ago, but i still really like it. i used my own hand as reference (for some reason i used the hand i was drawing with) i’ve always been fairly good at drawing hands and when i sent this on an art group chat i’m in, i was quickly accused of being a witch. i can only draw to a level i like when i have a reference, and i always have my hands so it’s the thing i’ve drawn the most. i didn’t have the colour for my hands, but i think it turned out good

and finally,

i’m really proud of this one, i was sick and really bored when i drew it. this is from tgcf vol 6, but i’ve always been really impressed by the tgcf official art and how they look hand drawn but also digital. (you can see brush strokes but they look too perfect). i didn’t have all the different shades of grey, but i think i did well.

thanks for looking at all my art, here are the references i used and where they’re from

i don’t have the reference for number 9 but i’ll reblog with it when i find it

also i plan on showing more of my art but i need to find the original authors of the references

[orenji-iro-no-sora]

Thoughts on TGCF Vol 2

Vol 1 | Vol 2| Vol 3| Vol 4| Vol 5| Vol 6| Vol 7| Vol 8

*Spoilers*

Firstly, the pace of the books has been just right. I could feel the tension rising gradually. After an almost light hearted investigation in the first book, this one definitely got more and more thrilling (and serious) but it didn't feel sudden at all.

Eming and good times in the Ghost City

I'd say one of my favourite parts of the second volume were the Hualian moments in the Ghost City. It was definitely the calm before the storm though. I could feel my heart racing when Hua Cheng appeared from the curtain. How did the author add so much tension when all they were doing was shaking a dice cup, I don't know!

Eming, the scimitar that could destroy heavenly officials, is childlike and sweet. I imagined it would be fierce because Jun Wu warned against it, but MXTX used it to show how different Hua Cheng is from what people think of him.

I theorised that maybe with Hua Cheng missing an eye, it probably belonged to the scimitar and Eming possessed his child spirit and could express emotions that Hua Cheng repressed. But that's just a theory and probably wrong considering that the spiritual instruments of MDZS all had a life and personality of their own so it's not possible for Eming to somehow have a part of Hua Cheng in it. Also in Arc 2, only one of his eyes was visible, so maybe he was blind from the start. I think this will be revealed later on.

Powerless Gods

With more insight into Ling Wen and her inability to get devotees despite being one of the hardest workers in the realm, and the Wind Master having to take up a female role, even the Gods are not spared from sexism, prejudices, and gender expectations. It's obvious considering their worshippers are humans who have been conditioned by society, and like Xie Lian says: "Who cared whether you were a god or a ghost? You were whatever people believed you to be."

At the end of the day, for Gods, worshippers carry the most power. While devotees fear the Heavens, they are the source of the official's "merits". Xie Lian was right to question the power dynamics between immortals and worshippers. Officials are helpless in how people perceive them (like Feng Xin lol), and they're powerless when it comes to mortal matters. They can't interfere and they can't influence.

And this truth, I believe, is one of the biggest sources of conflict for Xie Lian. He understands better than anyone that he's powerless (and yet powerful) which is why he fears disappointing others and doing the wrong thing (as he has already gone through it all in the past) and which is also why ascending for him, in my opinion, is a curse. He believed that by walking the path of the cultivator, he could become the saviour of his people. That his determination and goodwill could and would lead to eternal peace.

But in reality, there's no point to his ascension. The world carries its own fate and he can't change destiny. He's even more restricted in what he can do as he's no longer a mortal. While insults and harsh words can't stop him, as I believe Xie Lian has always been very confident in his virtue, I think they hurt just the same because he couldn't live up to his own convictions and they're a constant reminder of his shameful past.

Both Xie Lian and Hua Cheng aren't what they are rumoured to be. The kind of people they are, and how they have been perceived by others do not align. But that's pretty much the case for all characters. In reality too, people always see what they want to see.

However what's interesting is that Xie Lian and Hua Cheng have been imagined to the opposite extremes of the spectrum. To Lang Qianqiu, Xie Lian was a saint. (I'd admit that when he asked Qianqiu to not venerate him, I realised I had done the same.) To others, he was a failure and Hua Cheng was the devil. But both of them were more than that.

Xie Lian's frustration: the injustices despite kindness

In this sense, they both were their truest versions with each other. Which is why, when Xie Lian, finally, finally expressed his frustration and anger, it was to Hua Cheng.

Throughout vol 1, I was waiting for Xie Lian to express some irritation or anger or something that wasn't gentle acceptance. If he had fought Jun Wu after his ascension, he must have been pissed. And there's so much in his life that was unjust that there's no way he wouldn't be. Maybe 800 years is enough to get over it, I said to myself, but there must be days when it hits him. Every step he took, he took to save the common people but saving the people didn't coincide with doing the right thing.

For me, the most important part of the second book was when Xie Lian talked about the injustice of the Guilded Banquet. "He simply felt deeply wronged. He’d acted with such benevolence, but he didn’t receive equivalent kindness in return... I just don’t think it’s right for someone to have been kind but still meet a bad end. I don’t think it should have ended up this way."

Truer words have not been said!! I think one of the hardest aspects of doing the right thing, the kind thing, being morally and ethically inclined is that in this world, benevolence is rarely reciprocated. And I needed Xie Lian to say it. And he did. And I was glad that he admitted to it all.

Because despite knowing that kindness will not guarantee paradise, it may even lead to chaos, to him (and to me), it's still the right thing to do. That's why he wanted Qianqiu to continue being kind, even when the consequences were nonsense. That's why he'd take the blame and bear the responsibility.

Flowers and Butterflies, the cyclical nature of Hualian's fate

Finally, I really wanted to talk about Hualian and their intertwined fate. When Xie Lian saved Hua Cheng during the procession, he appeared like a white ethereal butterfly. And later when Hua Cheng rescues him, he uses his butterflies (deadly to others but gentle to xie lian) to break into Heaven. 'Hua' means flower is what Xie Lian saves at first and what becomes a symbol of his gentleness. And then later, Hua Cheng is the one who sought flowers and protected Xie Lian.

Also Hua Cheng is said to bring misfortune to all those around him and Xie Lian is the darling of the Heavenly Emperor. But he ends up believing that he's unlucky and causes harm to everyone near him and isolates himself while Hua Cheng always says that he's the luckiest.

In a way, their fates have been reversed. But also, they directly or indirectly brought fortune/misfortune in each other's life. Maybe it can be said that Xie Lian's ascension, which I think was his misfortune, was a result of Hua Cheng's star of solitude. Maybe Hua Cheng's power is Xie Lian's blessings. Or maybe everything has been fated and destined to happen exactly as it happened. Either way, I think it's neat.