#wip: df

[shizunfxxxer]

Hold on, I just finished Mysterious Lotus Casebook and I'm obsessed.

Finally able to get out and be a human today so did a quick FDB sketch.

Why's he tied up?? IDK he's just a silly little guy. I'm sure everything will be alright. Right? 🤔 Stay tuned to find out.

[bbcphile]

WIP Wednesday

Happy Wednesday! Have some more of my MLC longfic, where DFS wakes up while being carried back to Lotus Tower to a rather unpleasant surprise. (You can find all previous excerpts here.)

cw/tw: flashback to past imprisonment/allusion to past non-con (to skip, don't read the two italics lines starting with "Red robes.")

**

Di Feisheng’s eyes flew open, the faint echo of a hated bell ringing in his ears, and he tried to wrench his legs away from the arms pinning them in place.

“It’s alright, a-Fei,” soothed an oddly familiar voice, attached to not unfamiliar arms, which pressed his legs tighter against an unfamiliar flank. “You’re safe. It’s just a dream. Do you need to get down, or do you want me to keep going?”

Di Feisheng blinked and tried to force his spinning mind to work through the pulsing, stabbing pain threatening to split his head in two. He was being carried somewhere, that much was certain, but everything else had been covered by a layer of fog. Why couldn’t he remember? He shook his head to clear it and instantly regretted it, swallowing hard to force his stomach contents to stay where they were. 

“A-Fei?” The person carrying him stopped walking abruptly. “If you can hear me, tap once for down, twice to keep going home.”

Interesting. Weak and helpless as he was, he was being given choices. And as much as being stationary sounded preferable, going ‘home’ would give him time to remember what home even meant. And who this person who apparently shared it with him was. 

He tapped twice.

“Alright,” said the man carrying him. He started walking again, even more quickly than before. “It’s not much further now. You’ll be with him soon. Just hang on, a-Fei.”

Him? Who was–

–Xiangyi, his mind supplied. Li Xiangyi. Li Lianhua. 

Images of swords and slender fingers and a smirking mouth flitted through his mind.

“You can rest your head against me again, a-Fei,” the man whose hands weren’t Xiangyi’s said, “I really don’t mind.” A pause. “Or are you feeling better? Did the Yangzhouman help? I hope it’s alright that I tried again. I couldn’t think of what else to do. You weren’t responding when I called your na–”

–Yangzhouman? Xiangyi’s qi? 

He took a moment to check his meridians, and yes, there, buried under the pain and exhaustion, was its gentle, warm thrum.

“–Don’t understand! I kept it away from your Baihui acupoint this time! So what did I do wrong?” The young man sounded worried, and increasingly so by the second.

Hmm. The worst of the stabbing pain did originate in the Baihui acupoint. And there was some sort of blockage around it comprised entirely of Beifeng Baiyang–nearly a complete seal–that was keeping the rest of his too-meager qi from circulating smoothly. Yangzhouman would clear the blockage instantly, but judging from what the man had just said, clearing it had contributed to if not caused his current incapacitation. But if he only thinned out the blockage instead of eliminating it, let some of his own qi through, it might help him regain his strength along with the swaths of memories he was so clearly missing. And maybe it would make his skull feel less impaled.

Slowly, carefully, he pulled some of his qi out from his Baihui point and sent it toward Qianding closer to his forehe–

Red robes. A high-pitched giggle. Hands yanking down his undergarments, and–

Di Feisheng jerked back, gasping for breath, almost pulling free from the arms that trapped him. Or . . . held him? 

Blue robes. The jangle not of a bell or laugh but of a jade pendant against a tiger head pommel. A familiar arm and shoulder catching him before he could hit the cave floor– “A-Fei! What are you–what happened?” the man–no, Fang Duobing–asked, craning his neck to try to look over his shoulder. “Are you in pain? Should I stop?”

Di Feisheng shook his head and closed his eyes, his hands clenching into fists against Duobing’s chest as he wrestled his lungs and mind back under control. That was the past. It was over and she was dead, no matter what images were playing in his mind.  

“Alright. I’ll–I’ll go faster. Just hold on.” Duobing took off into a full sprint, Huli Jing barking and running by his side.

[peridot-tears]

WIP Wednesday: Di Feisheng is an MMA fighter and Li Lianhua is his chiropractor. They're in the Wild West.

“I’m Li Wenhao,” the man offers. He’s dressed in the style of this neo-city: His hair has been stitched into a long braid, and he’s donned leather boots and gloves. There are even spurs on his boots. But he hasn’t abandoned the curly bangs, long silver earrings, or the comfortable black T-shirt and jeans. All-in-all, he looks like a K-pop idol and cowboy were smashed together like Play-Doh.

“Di Feisheng,” says Di Feisheng.

The K-pop cowboy with the Qing Dynasty queue smiles awkwardly. “That’s a name. Were your parents literati?”

“I have no clue, but they didn’t give me the name,” Di Feisheng responds, taking a sip of his drink. Johnny Walker. Isn’t that from Scotland? That’s not very “Wild West” of this place.

“Well, it’s a nice name,” the man continues, only mildly nonplussed.

Di Feisheng quirks an eyebrow. That’s always a good sign. Mildly nonplussed is good. Perhaps this could lead somewhere after all.

“What brings you to Lao Xi?” he asks, gesturing for him to drink.

The man opens his mouth, starting on a, “I came to…” when the swinging doors to the saloon fly open, revealing the silhouette of someone wearing the most ridiculous Sheriff Woody cosplay in the world. He’s so tall, Di Feisheng could swear it’s Liu Yuning in the flesh.

The sillier the outfit, the stronger the fighter!

He leaps up to be the first to fight this new challenger with a muttered “excuse me” to his now-abandoned date, as Woody Liu roars out the custom invitation to brawl: “This town ain’t big enough for the two of us!”

Di Feisheng plants himself before him, shoving all potential MMA pilgrims to this place out of the way. Mine, mine, mine, his inner voice chants with single minded focus.

“I’m Di Feisheng from Jinyuan Alliance,” he declares.

[milksnake-tea]

its official. i've surpassed the last df fic's word count

[xxcxelum]

EUNOIA↬ she/her // cabin 7 // slytherin // infp-t // spotify // landing //

ah, okay, hi! i have a lot of thoughts about my ocs and wips, so i needed somewhere to put them. i'll probably also reblog a lot of writing stuff idk we'll see where this blog goes. also you can always yap to me about your own writing/ocs or anything because we all need an outlet

MY WIPS↴

keeping caelum (main wip!!) to love and to loathe (nanowrimo '24) red deleted footage what killed the cat

any writing posted on this blog belongs to me. please to not repost anywhere or claim as your own. © 2024 xxcxelum

[minqueee]

hiii i made a little animatic for my hero :> (wip bc i am tired and take so long to make stuff like this)

+ nx's room in serenity's inn [and dog bed for nemesis] and also nem making biscuits my silliest guy

(Audio: 9 to 5 by Dolly Parton)

[mx-myth]

Fanghua got me in the biggest chokehold I'm writing yet ANOTHER fic for them. Hopefully it'll actually end up being a 5+1 and not a [however many times I can squeeze out]+1...

Also the post-canon fanghua fic where llh learns to love that supposed to have cozy vibes? Yeah I pounded it out yesterday and those vibes are NOT cozy. Unless you think breakdowns are cozy. It's a little short and I'll probably go back to edit it but We Can't Have Nice Things Apparently.

[setsuntamew]

NEW WIG DAY!!! My wife and I are gonna cosplay Double Face and I'm looking forward to styling these :D

Madara's looks VERY wavy but I've since brushed it out and it's now just like.... gentle waves that will style quite nicely into his hairstyle. I've also got more wefts to sew into it ✌️

anyway all my wig styling supplies are on the third floor of my house and the air conditioning broke and it's over 100 degrees, so I will NOT be going up there until after the sun has set and it's cooled down some

[capricioussun]

I already have.like 10 wips for art fight refs but I have started a new one <3

[darkest-fluid]

WiP Wednesday

It lives! Chapter 6 is coming along slowly, but it is coming along. As usual, this is unedited and subject to change. Chapters 1-5 of Undertow can be accessed on AO3 Overall fic rating: E (This sample is rated M) CW: blood play

Astarion sucks the lingering traces of blood from Lyr’s mouth, leaning against his body with a sigh. “Gods, you taste incredible. I wish I could just… get drunk on you all day.”

Lyr gives a barely perceptible laugh, eyes half-lidded in this dreamy expression. His breath washes over Astarion’s lips like sunlight. “After last night, I don’t think I’d last very long.”

“No?” Astarion lifts an eyebrow teasingly. “Trouble with stamina?”

“That is not what I meant.” Lyr leans into the kiss, claiming Astarion’s mouth for a few intoxicating moments. When he pulls back, he lets his lips graze over Astarion’s in this tantalizing promise. “For the record, I have excellent stamina.”

“Do you?” Astarion can feel his sense of control unraveling. When he speaks, his voice sounds airy and distant.

“It’s one of my most consistent character traits.”

“Hmm,” Astarion demurs, “I think I might need some proof of that.” Lyr grazes his lips again, kissing the edge of his mouth in this slow, deliberate fashion.

“If we had time, and privacy… I would fuck you over…” Lyr dips down to kiss his neck. “And over…” Another kiss, trailing across Astarion’s throat. “And over. Until we’re both so tired we can barely move.” He kisses Astarion on the mouth, slowly. “Until everything around us just… melts away. And all we can hear is the sound of our own hearts beating.”

Astarion shuts his eyes, exhaling in shallow breaths. Beneath his feet, the ground seems to fall away. “Is that a promise?”

Lyr nestles their faces together, brushing his nose over Astarion’s cheekbone affectionately. “Only if you want it to be.”

Something about the gesture: the gentleness of it, the sincerity, causes Astarion to pull back. “Listen, Lyr, I–”

But then a voice shouts in the distance: “Vlaakith help me, if I have to come and find you fools I will skin you alive!”

A bubble of laughter escapes Lyr’s lips, wry and conspiratorial. He takes a step back, observing Astarion with an expression that seems to shift from affection to something more complicated. “I suppose that’s our cue.” After a beat he adds, softer, “What were you going to say?”

“Oh, nothing.” Astarion waves a hand dismissively. He feels dizzy and flushed. The sunlight streaming through the dappled leaves is suddenly far too bright. It takes a moment for him to recover his composure, stepping back into the relief of the shade. When he looks at Lyr, he offers him a beguiling smile. “I was going to accuse you of stealing my lines.”

Lyr laughs. “They aren’t your lines if I’m the one saying them.”

“Hm,” Astarion muses. “You do have a rather precocious habit of changing the rules.”

Lyr tilts his head, resting his hands on his hips. His shoulders rise and fall with his breath. Astarion can hear his heart beating, can sense the flow of blood through his body (quick, vivid, aroused.) It makes him want to cross the distance again, to kiss him over and over and over; to taste him in ways he’s only imagined. (And he could, surely. Lae’zel’s threats be damned.) “I wasn’t aware there were any rules. Apart from the obvious.”

“‘The obvious?’”

“Consent. Respect. Mutual desire. Shared pleasure.”

“Consent…” Astarion repeats, rolling the word in his mouth as though it had some weight, some gravity all its own. Suddenly, he laughs. The sound gushes out of him in a wave, churning and crashing over his lips. Something inside of him fractures like burst glass. Distantly, he feels the rush of Lyr’s pulse lose its rhythm, but he doesn’t look up. He sets his hand on a tree and anchors himself to it. “What a beautiful lie."

In the aftermath, everything goes very quiet.

“Astarion...” Lyr's voice sounds heavy with gravity. "It's not a lie."

Astarion twists his mouth into a hollow approximation of a smile. “So you say.” He lifts his posture and steps out of the shade, running a hand through his hair to fix the stray curls. After a moment, he turns and gestures for Lyr to follow. “We really ought to get back.”

[shizunfxxxer]

I realize I just posted a chibi cutie, but I really love drawing big strong surly sword men like little potato cats. 💕

Grumpy sleepy kitty, Di Feisheng WIP! I can't stop myself. He deserves to rest.

I wonder what he's dreaming about...

[bbcphile]

WIP Wednesday

Happy Wednesday! Have more of LLH's POV from my MLC longfic, in which LLH panics about what's wrong with a-Fei, and DFS resorts to desperate measures to reassure him.

(You can find earlier excerpts here.)

His meridians were unharmed. But his qi–

The great, howling tempest of level eight Beifeng Baiyang had been pinioned, reduced to a sluggish draft.

“How?” Li Lianhua managed, gripping a-Fei’s wrist as though the force could rile it up to its former glory.

A-Fei shook his head and looked away. “It doesn’t matter.”

“Of course it matters!” Li Lianhua yelled. “You–a-Fei, this shouldn’t be possible! Not with the rate your qi replenishes. What did you do?”

A-Fei’s jaw clenched and he pulled his hand free. “What I had to.”

Li Lianhua gripped the bedding, his mind reeling. Even when he’d blocked a-Fei’s meridians with asura grass, a-Fei had meditated daily, refusing to let his qi become depleted even when he couldn’t possibly use it. And now A-Fei was too depleted to use qinggong. Or to defend himself. What could have possessed him to–

Oh. Oh Gods, no. “A-Fei,” Li Lianhua said, trying to force his voice to be steady, “tell me this isn’t from healing me. Tell me this isn’t from that procedure that you promised was safe for both of you.”

“It’s not from the procedure,” a-Fei said, still staring straight ahead and refusing to look at him.

“He’s telling the truth,” Xiaobao interrupted. “The procedure really is safe. There were just a lot of emergencies today that needed extra qi to address! And he brought you up a mountain with qinggong. Of course he’s running a little low.”

Li Lianhua couldn’t stop the almost hysterical laugh that burst free. “A little low? Having only ten percent of his neili left is not a little!”

“Wh-what?” Xiaobao asked, more breath than sound.

A-Fei’s arm twitched and his hand tightened around his dao.

 So a-Fei had lied to Xiaobao about how dangerous it was. “That’s it. You can forget about trying it again.”

“Xiaohua’er!” Xiaobao cried.

A-Fei whipped around to face him. “It wasn’t the procedure, Xiangyi. I give you my word.”

“Then what else was it, a-Fei? Unless you spent the last three months single-handedly fighting the entire jianghu or living off qi alone? Because nothing else makes sense.” 

A-Fei stared at him, unmoving, his too-regular breaths the only evidence of whatever war he waged with himself. At last, he swallowed, his throat bobbing with the movement, and closed his eyes. “I wasn’t fighting the jianghu,” he said quietly, as though there were something wrong with that.

Li Lianhua let a-Fei’s answer unravel and re-knit itself in his mind, then took a moment to breathe until the urge to pick up a-Fei’s dao and hit him in the head with it had passed. “I see. And why, exactly, did the great Di-mengzhu decide to forgo sleeping and try to live off qi alone? Is this some new strategy to reach a hitherto unknown ninth level of Beifeng Baiyang?” 

For a moment, a-Fei was so still Li Lianhua thought he wouldn’t answer. Then he squared his shoulders, opened his eyes, and stared straight into Li Lianhua’s. “I was looking for you,” he said, each word a promise.

Li Lianhua closed his eyes to force back yet more tears. This wasn’t supposed to happen. The letter should have prevented this. A-Fei was supposed to accept Li Xiangyi’s death and his own martial arts supremacy, and fight Xiaobao when he found himself missing their rivalry. Instead, a-Fei had run himself into the ground, relinquished the strength he had tried so hard to gain, all to chase after a ghost. A ghost who had selfishly abandoned him, who was harming him still by his inability to stay gone, hurting him just as much as if he had poisoned him with Bicha. “What were you thinking?” he asked, losing the battle against the ocean of tears as they crashed against his lashes.

There was a quiet rustle of clothes and sheets. Then warm, callused fingers cradled his face as though he mattered, with a hesitance and gentleness that spoke a language he didn’t want to understand. “My qi is replaceable,” a-Fei said, his thumb caressing Li Lianhua’s cheekbone with a touch too feather-light to wipe the tears away, succeeding only in brushing a faint wet streak from his nose to his ear. “You are not.” 

 Li Lianhua swallowed and shook his head, the words stabbing him harder than a-Fei’s dao ever could. A selfish part of him wished it were true, that a-Fei truly wanted him, not the ghost of Li Xiangyi a-Fei saw when he looked at him. But as much as it hurt to hear, as much as he hurt a-Fei by not making him face the truth, as much as he ought to brush off the declaration the way a-Fei had brushed off the tears, to say he was being ridiculous, sentimental, absurd, he couldn’t. Not when he knew what it had cost a-Fei to say that out loud, and with an audience: a sacrifice almost as great as the wangchuan flower had been. He couldn’t throw this gift away. Not now, at least. 

They’d discuss a-Fei’s destroying himself for a dead man later.

[peridot-tears]

WIP Wednesday: Cowboy!FDB, Chiropractor!LLH, Fighter!DFS

“This entire town feels like a fever dream,” Di Feisheng finds himself saying. “K-pop aesthetics next to Old West buildings like we just walked into an old American film. Now our traditional Chinese medicine in a covered wagon.”

He gestures at the anatomical poster on the wall, which charts out every meridian point in the human body. A matching bust sits on a shelf next to it.

“When in Rome,” Li Lianhua says, pulling up a chair at the small table and gesturing for Di Feisheng to do the same. “Tea?”

“No thank you,” Di Feisheng says, but Li Lianhua is already on his feet again, pouring from a kettle into a teapot. That wasn’t a question, then.

“May I ask,” Di Feisheng says when Li Lianhua has rejoined him, “how old are you?”

“Twenty-eight,” Li Lianhua responds, pouring out cups for them both.

So he’s only two years younger than Di Feisheng, and not just an older gentleman with the best skincare routine known to man. Interesting.

“Thank you.” Di Feisheng takes a sip. He can’t taste anything, but the bouquet tells him it’s jasmine.

Li Lianhua asks, “I assume you’re a brawler?”

Di Feisheng, baffled by the buffalo, the wagon, and the man, almost forgot why he’s here.

Almost. “I am,” he says, “and I need to work the knots out of my back.”

“Not just knots,” Li Lianhua says. “You’re clearly a grappler, so I take it that your shoulder has hit the ground more times than is healthy. It should be seizing up any day now. The thin fabric on your robe tells me that you know it’s easy to choke a man if his collar or lapels are thick enough. You’ve trained for it, so you know how it feels, but still, it’s a miracle you haven’t gotten a neck cramp yet. You’re lucky to have found me—I can crack you and massage you. Whenever you’re ready, you can get on the table and we can start now.”

Yes. Di Feisheng loves a man who understands him. He didn’t even know you could get neck cramps from too much choking. He nods vigorously, following Li Lianhua’s instructions to shuck off his clothes down to his neiyi, lying on his front so Li Lianhua can probe his back.

Li Lianhua tuts as he trails cool fingers across the landscape of knots and muscles. “Di-xiansheng, you’ve done a number on your opponents, but you’ve also done a number on yourself. We call that ‘equivalent exchange.’”

[irishk0rn]

wip sketch of wrathion look at those fucking l e g s.

also finally comfortable in my wrathion style HAHA

[xxcxelum]

DELETED FOOTAGE

koen ashiro and bella rosewald were the two best agents in the national undercover operations agency (nuoa). koen having joined when he was still a child, and bella naturally skilled in secrecy. and not only that, but they were the most infamous couple before they broke up. bella and koen, koen and bella. but after they ended their relationship, the two of them never spoke outside of nuoa-related meetings. that is until they're forced together on a mission. and to make matters even worse, the newest, most inexperienced recruit, ian sawyer, is assigned on the mission with them.

"SMILE, YOU'RE ON CAMERA"

[aris-has-a-paracosm]

ArisArisArisAris Aris Aris please I'm begging you canwe see wips for Deepfrost drawing

please please please can we be permitted a tiny glance inside the brain of tumblr artist aris-has-a-paracosm?

Yes can do! <3 Here’s a little bit about my art process for the Deepfrost art :)

So here’s a screenshot from the sketch. (It wasn’t completely done at the time, but it’s the only screenshot I still have of that part.)

I sketch in any color other than black so I can more easily see my lineart later, and red is often what I default to. I also had two-point perspective grid lines set up, but I didn’t really adhere to them. As you can see, DF’s face did undergo a little bit of editing before the lineart happened. I opted to go for a toothy grin rather than the open-mouthed smile he originally had here.

Speaking of lineart:

Regardless of what brush I use, I always make sure that my lineart connects neatly to itself for each part of every drawing (separate lineart layers for each component.) There’s no gaps anywhere, so it makes it to where I can easily use an inverse selection to put a base color layer directly beneath. My base layers are always in gray going from lighter in the background to darker in the foreground.

Next up was rendering the background:

This is- … this is definitely a “rest of the heckin’ owl” kinda thing XD. The buildings were in three layers with the windows drawn in vertical lines and then erased in horizontal lines.

Here’s a gif to show that? Please excuse my atrocious Timelapse quality :’)

Once the windows were all on there, I used alpha lock on the layer and then just randomly recolored windows based on reference photos of cities at night. Once the windows were done, I used some airbrushing for ambiance.

Next up was the base colors for the foreground:

Here, I was mainly focused on the outfit and ice detail. All of this was important to get the way I wanted pre-render, and absolutely nothing about lighting was considered here.

Afterwards was DF’s rendering:

I had two separate shadow layers and one light layer, keeping my light source and his three-dimensionality in mind the whole time. Here was where I also did lineart recoloring and cleanup.

And then all I had left was to render the ice, the rooftop, and add the snow! I don’t fully know how to explain this part either, but I primarily used a soft airbrush and a medium nozzle spray paint brush as well as an eraser in both of those settings as well.

So yeah! That’s the basics of my art process! I like to joke that when I draw, my brain lives in my hands so I don’t think too much about the process while drawing. I had a lot of fun with this and hope you liked seeing the process :D