#xianxia fashion

[fuckyeahchinesefashion]

when you have a twin sister and you both are models (cr: 小心头-小意头)

[hanfugallery]

chinese hanfu in xianxia style by 清欢纪

[sfwclwn]

more studies this time on robes

trying to figure out how I can draw so I'm not overwhelmed by the prospect of actually doing it

[angstandhappiness]

INTERESTING

In wuxia I see that they have half their hair up and the other half down. Is there a certain period where this hairstyle directs from?

Hi, thanks for the question, and sorry for taking ages to reply!

The half-up, half-down hairstyle that you often see on both male & female characters in Chinese guzhuang (period costume) dramas is not based on historical hairstyles. Rather, it is a fairly recent styling convention, most likely originating from late 20th century wuxia TV shows from Hong Kong (x). Over time the hairstyle has become normalized and commonplace in Chinese costume dramas, especially in the wuxia and xianxia genres (because these genres are not necessarily aiming for historical accuracy in the first place).

Below, from left to right: Wang Hedi in Love Between Fairy and Devil, Deng Wei in Miss the Dragon, Xiao Zhan in The Untamed, Gong Jun in Word of Honor: 

As @niteshade925 explains in this post, for male characters, the main idea of the hairstyle is to make the character look attractive, and also in some shows/context, to hint at the character’s personality, as in maybe they do not adhere to traditional customs and are free-spirited/spontaneous. For female characters, it is usually just a regular hairstyle without deeper meaning :P

For more information on this half-up half-down hairstyle, and historical hairstyles in general, please see the following posts:

The historical accuracy of half-up half-down hairstyles

The historical accuracy of ponytails

Historical hairstyles for men

Hope this helps!

[diushek]

Shen Yuan concept without being a NEET just because my sister and I thought of this and lol we had a good time

So Shen Yuan is this rich kid and all, but he actually has this hobby that started taking up 80% of his free time: designing clothes. He started out as a cosmaker, can you blame him? Cosplays are so poor quality these days. And Shen Yuan is used to good quality clothes even if they are just simple t-shirts. So when he started realizing how pathetically expensive some cosplays were compared to their quality, he just... Well, he had to design his own!

Little by little, he evolved. And one day his wealthy family found him this job designing clothes for xianxia dramas, and Shen Yuan, a little delirious, accepted. It's okay! He designed a lot of sketches inspired by arts, historical research here and there, things that also looked nice and realistic. Shen Yuan enjoys his job almost as much as he enjoys criticizing each new PIDW chapter. How is it possible that they've been thirty chapters into that subplot and there have been more papapa scenes than a resolution?! Outrageous!

Shen Yuan designs a lot. He still works as a cosmaker, as he really enjoys doing embroidery. It's a time-consuming job, but he gets paid well and his cosplays are the best in the entire community. His family is happy that he has left his lonely life and has this job and this new business experience, they congratulate him on his new achievements, they urge him to enroll in some university fashion or clothing design.

Shen Yuan dismisses it. He misses his life as a NEET a little, but in reality on his days off he just plays around and does nothing, which is the same thing he does on his work days, except he embroiders and sews or draw on those work days. Days so busy, they are not.

So Airplane ends PIDW like absolute shit, Shen Yuan drowns and dies.

And he opens his eyes. Well, what the hell. It doesn't take long for him to discover that he transmigrated into an NPC. Tailored, apparently, because he's an no-name NPC apprentice to a spider demon seamstress!

He has a lot of knowledge about all of this, so it doesn't take him long to put it into practice. His teacher congratulates him and he makes a lot of sales. Soon, he gains a very good reputation. Maidens from other kingdoms come to Shen Yuan to design clothes for them for festivals, for dances, for family celebrations. Shen Yuan designs, sews, embroiders. It's not far from his old life, although he misses Project Sekai and caffeine a little.

He opens his own workshop almost a year later, with the goodwill of his demon teacher. She warns him of something: Shen Yuan is a thread woven to another soul. And soon, his soulmate will come for him.

Shen Yuan is a little nervous, but, oh well! A soulmate! If only!

He knows, for a fact, that that's impossible. They're in the disgusting world of PIDW, and at least half of the dresses he's made have been for Binghe's future wives. Some would even be torn apart without any care! What a waste of his time and effort!

He doesn't think about it too much. Shen Yuan just focuses on his work. He designs, sews, embroiders. He sleeps little but enjoys the smile on the faces of the Meimei's when they hug the pretty fabrics. It is, despite everything, a good life.

Then, Emperor Luo Binghe arrives at his door.

In person. Not with servants, not with a letter, not with an invitation. It is Emperor Luo Binghe who arrives at his door.

Of course Shen Yuan is going to make robes for the emperor! There's no need for him to ask or offer to pay for them! He's nervous and a little scared, but Luo Binghe is... well, he doesn't seem to have no kind of threatening aura or any kind of charm. He asks him for the designs of some robes and stays there while Shen Yuan makes the first sketches. Luo Binghe gives more directions, more corrections... And Shen Yuan discovers that Luo Binghe is requesting Qing Jing robes from him, if the fanarts are accurate. He tears off that sheet of paper, starts another sketch with Qing Jing's exact robes without uttering any words, leaving Luo Binghe speechless as well. Luo Binghe nods, correcting details of length and shape, not even asking or saying anything about designs of cultivators clothing, and Shen Yuan has to move on to the... er, awkward part. He has to almost strip Luo Binghe to take his measurements!

Ignore that part. His face is very red when he finishes, but he has the exact measurements of his back, his arms, the size of his fit, his length and width, everything necessary to work with the first molds.

Shen Yuan has no idea why Emperor Luo Binghe wants Qing Jing's robes. He won't ask either, he values his tongue very much. So, he just decides to continue his work like a good professional, embroidering every detail to perfection (he has done two Ning Yingying cosplays in the past, so, it was easy to him remember the embroidered patterns).

Maybe he makes it too perfect.

Luo Binghe is looming over him, his new robes on display, eyes red with fury, zuiyin shining on his forehead.

"Cang Qiong has been burned for more than two hundred years. How can a weak mortal like you recreate these patterns so perfectly?"

Shen Yuan has three options, honestly.

a) Tell him he's a transmigrator. He doesn't have any fucking System, and maybe telling him he's from another world will save him from his imminent death... But he highly doubts Luo Binghe will believe him.

b) Telling him that he's a reborn soul! That he may have worked for the sect in the past! It's not a bad idea, and it's actually quite common, isn't it? Some souls are reborn with some memories, huh, not bad...

c) Not saying anything and playing dumb.

Shen Yuan chooses to play dumb, only because he doesn't have enough brain cells and is so panicked that he can play the reborn.

"I don't know what Junshang is telling me! I just followed the directions and patterns in the design given by Jungshang!"

Luo Binghe does not strangle him. Makes things worse.

Luo Binghe carries him over his shoulder and carries him away. This is kidnapping?! Shen Yuan is being kidnapped from his own shop in broad daylight!? And obviously no one is going to stop him!!

And so, Luo Binghe simply puts him in a room somewhere in the palace, gives him some papers and many tools so he can draw and tells him to design something that he like. And he leaves.

... That is, a kind of test? Is Luo Binghe testing him in some way? Ah, he hopes his customers will be understanding. He's sorry for the delay in their dresses, but Emperor Luo Binghe has kidnapped this seamstress, but he hope to get back to business soon!!

(Luo Binghe is having the closest thing to astral travel. Why does that boy who looks like a young and sweet version of Shen Qingqiu know the patterns of Qing Jing so well? Is he his own "kind" Shen Qingqiu in this world? So why does he act like this and not like a haughty teacher? What should he do?

At least he brought him to his palace. He's not sure if he's the person he's looking for, but, well... he's not really going to let him out of his sight. Just in case.)

[aamputation]

more SVSSS stuff for y'all, although this is new.

I've been toying with the idea of writing a little ditty I wrote a little of a thing, where SY gets dumped into PIDW as himself, just a random NPC with a dutiful little System just doing its best. this is my design for him, including his spiritual weapons. more details below the read more.

my other SVSSS art -> [ here ] & [ here ] shout out to adornedwithlight for the reblog banner

SY is definitely a fuerdai (second-gen rich kid) but he's not exactly the healthiest. He's smart and graduated college, and in this universe he's a celebrated published author, like in this post by @/princessdave (should I tag them? hurk idk, lemme know?). The rest of his family is famous in some way because of their wealth, but he's basically a hermit. He dresses well because he can afford to, but he'd happily live in rags and squalor so long as he has some food, a bed, and trash webnovels to read.

After he accidentally dies after cussing out Airplane's shitty cliffhanger ending, SY finds himself in a predicament. The System he first encounters is the System from canon: a rude bitch trying to put his soul into SQQ. SY nopes out of there, cites bodily autonomy, pitches an unholy fit, and somehow, someway, there's an error. Either SQQ didn't die during his Qi Deviation, or it's too early in the timeline and SY can't do any body snatching! Hallelujah!

The OG System, having lost its Host and overall purpose, discards SY like yesterday's news. He's left behind in the empty space, and is tentatively approached by this new System. It tells him that he can't go back to his body since he's dead as a doornail and offers to pop him into the PIDW universe. SY's millenial ass just goes "meh, fuck it, we ball" and he's thrown into PIDW as himself.

The new, Benevolent System accompanies SY, and attaches itself to him. It explains the B-Points system and promises to be helpful, immediately giving SY 100 starting B-Points and opening the System Store. SY takes full advantage, and uses his 100 points to the fullest in adjusting his body to survive and thrive in a Xianxia setting like PIDW. He then asks where in the plot he was dumped into the story, and the System tells him. (Haven't decided on whether to start pre-PIDW storyline, or at the SVSSS storyline start, either way, it works.)

Clearly a scholar more than anything else, SY immediately hyper-fixates on writing the best bestiaries across the PIDW-verse, so the fashion he buys from the System Store is all modest at best, although he'd splurged to get a Qiankun pouch. He'd also vehemently argued with his System to be able to justify keeping his hair as short as possible ("if it's too long it's just going to get in the way when I study monsters! I don't have the time to care for it!")

SY focused his cultivation on useful things, and the System responded accordingly. He gained skills with Alchemical Arts, Formation (Array) Arts, Talisman Arts, Beast Cultivation, and Martial Arts focused on the shortsword and the fan. The System manifested itself into SY's fan, to provide an easier interface during his travels, and his first mission led him to find his spiritual shortsword.

Yù Shòu Shī Rèn 驭兽师刃 — The Beastmaster's Blade

A legendary weapon created by a powerful cultivator who was both a master of beasts and a warrior. This cultivator forged the weapon after making a pact with a heavenly demonic beast, granting them the ability to call upon creatures for assistance in battle. The blade was crafted using beast materials—the fang of a Heavenly White Snow Dragon* and the claw of an Abyssal Flame Ghost Hound**—imbuing it with both spiritual and physical properties. * Tiān Bái Xuě Lóng (天白雪龙) ** Shēn Yuān Yàn Guǐ Quǎn (深渊焰鬼犬) In combat, the Beastmaster's Blade allows SY to summon beasts, control their movements, and enhance his own combat abilities by drawing power from these creatures. The blade has a secondary power, allowing SY to bond with a specific creature and form a partnership that amplifies both SY’s and the beast’s abilities. Depending on the bond strength, the blade can allow SY to temporarily transform into a more beast-like form, gaining enhanced senses, strength, or agility. It can also allow SY to merge his consciousness with a creature, enabling them to fight as one. The blade can also be used to command and direct beasts, issuing silent commands that the creatures obey, making SY an unstoppable force when surrounded by beasts in combat. The Beastmaster's Blade is a powerful and mystical weapon designed for a cultivator who can control, summon, and bond with beasts. Whether used to fight alongside beasts or to subdue them, the weapon emphasizes mastery over nature, the power of spiritual connection, and the balance between destruction and harmony. It is a weapon for those who understand that true power comes not only from force but from the deep bond between a cultivator and the natural world.

Rén Cí Xì Tǒng Shàn 仁慈系统�� — Benevolent System Fan

The fan itself is an elegant yet powerful weapon. It is a spiritual and otherworldly artifact, not only physically capable of defending SY, but also carrying the ability to influence the world through the System’s applications. It allows SY to prevent conflicts or resolve disputes with missions and Scenario Pushers. The System helps SY grow and influence the world around him in an active way, molding what was once a garbage story with solid roots into something worth reading. Unlike other systems that may have less than benevolent intentions, SY’s System encourages him to grow emotionally and reach self-fulfillment while enhancing the story. Missions from the System push SY to develop in the PIDW world, and all outcomes result in some type of reward for SY’s efforts, whether it be with behind-the-scenes insights, improved cultivation abilities, stronger fan powers, or even a free-pass deus ex machina. In combat, the fan focuses more on subduing rather than killing unless strictly necessary, using gentle yet powerful techniques that leave enemies incapacitated, cured, or redeemed. The fan boasts the ability to change the direction of the flow of energy, as well as wind-based powers, representing the System and SY’s will to shift the flow of the disastrous PIDW world around him.

[niteshade925]

April 20, Beijing, China, National Museum of China/中国国家博物馆 (Part 3 – Chinese Historical Fashion Exhibition):

Another cool exhibition that I visited while at the museum, showcasing popular fashion from different dynasties, historical artifacts, and some other relevant artifacts that gave a glimpse into the fashion of different dynasties. What's even cooler is that you can visit this exhibition virtually! (the site is in Chinese but I highly recommend it to everyone, there's so much more to the exhibition than the pictures I post here) Note that this exhibition does not only include historical hanfu, but also historical fashion of the 少数民族 that ruled some of the dynasties. This post will be pre-Ming fashion, and next post will be Ming and Qing era fashion. The reason is because Ming and Qing dynasties are the two most recent dynasties, so there are a lot of surviving artifacts from these two dynasties, which means there are 30+ pictures total and I couldn't fit them all into a single post.

First is a recreation of Han-era (202 BC - 220 AD) hanfu. The woman on the left is wearing a one-piece robe called a qujushenyi/曲裾深衣. The man on the right is wearing the outfit characteristic of Eastern Han dynasty (25 - 220 AD) civil officials, a combo of jinxianguan/进贤冠 hat and zaochaofu/皂朝服 clothing (皂 here means the color black, as in the word "青红皂白", or "blue and red, black and white"):

Left: model of a Han-era magpie tail cap/queweiguan/鹊尾冠 (you can see the influence of these Han-era men’s hats on the outfits of male characters in modern xianxia art). Right: recreation of a Han-era bian/弁 hat (the headscarf-like piece tied beneath the chin):

Line drawings of different hats worn by different types of officials based on artifacts and murals. The center and left sections are different hats of military officials (wuguan/武官 in Chinese), and the right section is different hat styles of civil officials (wenguan/文官 in Chinese).

Jumping back, this is a Warring States period (476 - 221 BC) iron daigou/带钩 inlaid with gold and jade and decorated with dragons. Daigou are basically belt buckles where the flat end is attached to one end of the belt, and the hook will hook into slits in the other end of the belt, so this is an extra fancy belt buckle:

On to Tang-era (618 - 907 AD) hanfu. From the left to right these are: the regular outfit of early Tang dynasty officials (color varies by rank, red is worn by fourth and fifth rank officials), the outfit of a female servant in early to mid Tang era, the ceremonial outfit of a Tang dynasty emperor, and the outfit of noblewomen in late Tang to Five Dynasties era (907 - 960 AD):

Song-era hanfu (front two) and Yuan-era Mongolian fashion (back two). Front left is the formal attire of Southern Song dynasty (1127 - 1279) civil officials (color varies by rank, red is worn by fourth and fifth rank officials), and front right is the regular outfit of women in Southern Song dynasty. Back left is the formal attire of Mongolian noblewomen in Yuan dynasty (1271 - 1368), and back right is the regular outfit of Mongolian men in Yuan dynasty.

Replicas of painted clay sculptures of women from Northern Song dynasty (960 - 1127), the original sculptures are in Hall of the Holy Mother/圣母殿 of Jinci Temple/晋祠 in Shanxi province:

By the way, in the case of Song dynasty, the descriptor "northern" and "southern" basically indicate time periods within Song dynasty (you can refer to the beginning of this post where I explain this in more detail).

And line drawing diagrams of different styles of futou/幞头 hats in Song dynasty based on paintings, murals, and other artifacts:

[starsofarda]

Silm fashion - Part 1/? - Feanor

So, OBVIOUSLY, with me being in the entire wuxia/xianxia/asian dramas in general it's really no surprise that my very first choice is going the hanfu way.

And Feanor and red just. They just slay, ok? But Clara, the colour of the House of Finwe is blue! Ok, fine I gotchu. Can we say that maybe at the beginning Feanor was wearing blue and then he changed to red bc he did not want to be associated with his step-brothers? Some people decide to be very petty in the most childish way, also I see Feanor's family drama, I see why he would do that.

Under cut!

Premise: if you recognize any Real Life actor, that's casualty. My purpose is the outfit.

So, we have established blue for teen!Feanor, there you go.

Then ofc his half-brothers are born, stuff happens, he becomes exactly ©That Bitch™.

Then it's exile of the Noldor time, and also the "I'm gonna fucking get my Silmarils back and fucking ruin that bitch boy Morgoth even if it kills me" time.

Bonus: wedding day with Nerdanel, just pretend that the girl hasred hair, ok?

[bl-bracket]

Anyways I was going to make a post about the process of picking bracket topics and whatnot and was trying to come up with some examples of types of topics that would or wouldn't work and for whatever reason I thought of the concept of a "best murderer bracket" and I can't stop thinking about it lmao

it's just like such a funny concept? the idea of fictional murderers battling it out, especially ones from bls (which like I don't think is most people who are not super familiar with the genre as having a lot of characters who have killed people) is just funny in like an absurd way. like abstracting yourself from tumblr and tournament blogs, the idea of telling someone else that there's a tournament going for fictional murderers from east asian mlm tv shows, a genre that for several years was primarily shows about high school and uni students.

anyways that devolved into thinking about it more seriously, and then deciding a more practical way of doing it would to make some kind of directory of bl murderers. which would then lead to a lot of interesting statistical analysis, like characters with highest on screen kill counts, which countries have the highest proportion of fictional killers, etc. you can then make a separate category for characters with implied kills that aren't explicitly shown on screen or vague. and you could track how the number increases over time, which I assume exponentially goes up as more bls are exploring darker and more serious genres.

anyways back to the country stats, I started thinking about what the breakdown would look like so here's my guess based on zero research and just my general knowledge of shows

China. While having very few bls (censored or otherwise), they have a very unfair advantage and that is genre conventions. The 3 biggest Chinese bls I can think of are: The Untamed, Word of Honor, and Guardian. With The Untamed and Word of Honor, the conventions of xianxia and wuxia genres means that there are a lot of characters and almost all of them have killed before (usually nameless canon fodder but still). And then with Guardian, it's a supernatural detective mystery show with murder plots in it and a lot of characters, which again leads to a pretty high kill count. So even only counting these 3 shows, China will probably have the most killers in bl, or at the very least most kills done.

Thailand. It's a numbers game on this one. There's just so many Thai bls and an increasing number of like detective or mafia ones. A show like Kinnporsche has a lot of killers and deaths. Then there's other shows that include a few murderers (but less than Kinnporsche) like The Sign, Manner of Death, 4 Minutes, 3 Will Be Free, Never Let Me Go (Palm did shoot a couple guys dead elt's nto forget), Dead Friend Forever, etc. However the numbers also hurt Thailand in terms of proportions, since there's a lot more Thai bls that don't have murder, so it actually might be 3rd.

Japan. You're not getting much murder from your Cherry Magics and Old Fashion Cupcakes, which is what a significant portion of bl fan's primary exposure to Japanese bl is, but let's not forget that there's a lot of dark Japanese bls where murder is definitely on the table. Now I don't actually have a good gauge of what the numbers on this is, cause I haven't really delved that deep into this corner of the bl market, so I can't make a good estimation but I bet there's more than I'm aware of.

Taiwan. They've got a couple of mafia shows like HIStory 3: Trapped and Kiseki: Dear to Me, both of which have some implied and explicit murder (though less then you would expect if we're honest). That'll give them a few kills and they also have a relatively smaller pool of shows to pull from, meaning percentage wise it's a bit higher.

South Korea. Ok I am far from an expert of bls from South Korea, but unless there's like obscure short films I'm not aware of, the only drama I can think of from here with kills is Long Time No See? or I guess The Director Who Buys Me Dinner has like 1.5 murders? anyways Korea also has a not insignificant amount of bls to their name so proportionally it will be quite low.

The Philippines. Out of all the countries on this list, I am least familiar with the bls from here, but from what I've gathered during my routine mdl searches, basically all of them seem to be murder-free (unless of course there's some shocking plot twists in them)

anyways I'll probably never do this project just cause it would require a lot of time and collaborative effort and I've got a lot irl going on right now (hence why the submission period for most whipped is so long lol) and also have some other projects I'm already planning on doing so I don't really have time to do it. but I wanted to tell y'all about my thoughts on the matter.

also sorry if this is the weirdest thing I've ever posted. kinda had a major stress breakdown today but then resolved it relatively quickly cause I realized I could just reschedule the life altering appointment that was causing the breakdown lmao so I'm in a strange frame of mind lol

[sakurapika]

Some ideas for Twisted Wonderland events

(*Mild spoilers for some JP server events and Chapter 6)

-A Mulan-themed event: In one of the Halloween events, Silver mentioned knowing the story of Mulan, and Lilia has mentioned having been to "the East" before (not to mention Diasomnia's Halloween costumes are longs). It would be lovely to see Lilia return to the TWST-equivalent of China with some of his friends and meeting new characters--bonus points if someone is twisted from Mushu. A story about a girl who makes a sacrifice for her aging father by enlisting in the military on his behalf fits well with Silver and Lilia, so now would be the perfect opportunity to give them duo magic! Also, Chinese xianxia/martial arts fantasy novels are very popular in Japan and abroad nowadays (if you know, you know :) ), and I would love to see the boys wearing hanfu--they'd look so majestic and cool!

-Sam's hometown event: A Princess and the Frog event where the boys go to the TWST version of New Orleans, chaperoned by Sam. It would be a great opportunity to explore the jazz and culinary scene, and, of course, wear 1920s-inspired clothing. Someone in Octavinelle gets an SSR.

-A pajama-party event: Night Raven College hosts an all-night pillow fight tournament, and everyone gets extremely competitive, kind of like Beanfest. Everyone wears pajamas--I'm not sure if they'd have their own outfits, or if the dorms would match and have PJ sets with their logo on it (kind of like the pajamas they sell at the JP Disney Store). In battle, the chibis throw pillows at each other.

-Octavinelle hometown event: We are introduced to the Tweels' parents and/or Azul's mother. Given how Jamil and Kalim's hometown event carried out, it is likely that only one of the three will actually get an event card, but we'll see. In the Halloween event, Riddle mentioned that he's never seen the sea before. Even though he's had a chance in the Lost in the Book with Stitch event (and the developers probably want to give the spotlight to different characters), I'm afraid he doesn't remember it. Anyway, he deserves to go again. Alternatively, there's an event where the boys go to the Sunshine Lands and meet Prince Rielle. In this case, Riddle and Azul must go together--it would be nice to see after the events of Chapter 6.

-Riddle and Trey hometown event/Black Butler crossover: We've already had a Heartslabyul-themed hometown event with Deuce, but this time, we get to meet Trey's family and Riddle's mother. The likelihood that we get a canon Black Butler crossover as well is very close to zero, but it would be really fun to make a few jokes/hints about Riddle having a younger cousin who wears an eyepatch and solves mysteries with his enigmatic butler. Bonus points if Riddle and Jade have duo magic and dress up in Victorian/ouji clothing.

-J-fashion event: Speaking of ouji clothing, it would be amazing if there was an event inspired by Japanese fashions and subcultures. I think there was a part in one of the anthology mangas where Vil gave the Pop Music Club a visual kei makeover. I know the Pop Music Club has their own SSRs already, but I wouldn't mind seeing more outfits in this style.

-An orchestra-themed event: Some of the NRC students form a classical orchestra. Malleus is there, of course--I imagine him playing the cello this time. The Octavinelle trio is there as well with their respective instruments, as is Idia and Riddle both playing violins. I can see Jamil playing a woodwind instrument--maybe a flute, a clarinet, or an oboe?

[queereads-bracket]

Queer Fiction Free-for-All Book Bracket Tournament: Round 1B

Book summaries below:

Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation: Mo Dao Zu Shi series by Mò Xiāng Tóng Xiù

Wei Wuxian was once one of the most outstanding men of his generation, a talented and clever young cultivator who harnessed martial arts, knowledge, and spirituality into powerful abilities. But when the horrors of war led him to seek a new power through demonic cultivation, the world's respect for his skills turned to fear, and his eventual death was celebrated throughout the land.

Years later, he awakens in the body of an aggrieved young man who sacrifices his soul so that Wei Wuxian can exact revenge on his behalf. Though granted a second life, Wei Wuxian is not free from his first, nor the mysteries that appear before him now. Yet this time, he'll face it all with the righteous and esteemed Lan Wangji at his side, another powerful cultivator whose unwavering dedication and shared memories of their past will help shine a light on the dark truths that surround them.

Romance, fantasy, historical fiction, xianxia, series, adult

Like a Love Story by Abdi Nazemian

It's 1989 in New York City, and for three teens, the world is changing.

Reza is an Iranian boy who has just moved to the city with his mother to live with his stepfather and stepbrother. He's terrified that someone will guess the truth he can barely acknowledge about himself. Reza knows he's gay, but all he knows of gay life are the media's images of men dying of AIDS.

Judy is an aspiring fashion designer who worships her uncle Stephen, a gay man with AIDS who devotes his time to activism as a member of ACT UP. Judy has never imagined finding romance…until she falls for Reza and they start dating.

Art is Judy's best friend, their school's only out and proud teen. He'll never be who his conservative parents want him to be, so he rebels by documenting the AIDS crisis through his photographs.

As Reza and Art grow closer, Reza struggles to find a way out of his deception that won't break Judy's heart--and destroy the most meaningful friendship he's ever known.

Historical fiction, 1980s, coming of age, young adult

[fuckyeahchinesefashion]

Character design, the archer lutong鹿童(the deer boy) from NeZha2: Mo Tong Nao Hai (the demon child's havoc in the sea)

[hanfugallery]

chinese hanfu by 云间山泽

[kunosoura]

Game of the year 2024 for me is In Stars and Time. Absolutely nothing has occupied as much brain space as it. Emotionally masturbatory self harm story about isolating yourself and lashing out coated in the chocolate of a time travel story with maudlin fem of center he/they protagonist, this was precision targeted media and it did critical damage to me, all systems failing.

Runners up:

2. Wandering Sword, the game that finally introduced me to how much xianxia/cultivation genre stories can kick ass. Kinda crazy to release two free massive expansions that completely overhaul the second and third acts to better include your companions and choices as like, optional routes.

3. Crystal Project: it really is just FF5 as a minecraft jumping puzzle. I love the sense of progression and how there’s an intended linear route but also dozens of ways to break off the path and jump way ahead if you’re clever. I wish the game did a little more to onboard you to the endgame where there’s absolutely no room for inefficiency in your team and that the story had been a little less.. that, but for an otherwise rock solid game made by a single person I’m willing to give it some slack.

4. Shadow of the Erdtree: you already know whats goin on.. I don’t care how much you call it cringe or Reddit I still love the light greatswords. And I still think PC Radahn is an all time low of boss design and I hate that some of the best fashion is locked behind it. Another game with problems carried across the finish line by incredible world design and exploration

5. Cyber77: For all that the discourse was endless about this game, the post PL state of it when I first played it was good overall. I hated that the writers didn’t learn subtlety or restraint or nuance to any degree until PL because the difference in the writing was stark, but it’s still a great game with even a few genuinely compelling points. Blackwall Gateway go brrrrrr

Other mentions:

Dragdog2: you didn’t live up to my expectations and even more blatantly had parts chopped off in the conceptual phase than 1 despite being billed as a more complete game. But your exploration was fun and thief was fun even if I resent you most of all for making sorcerer and magic archer suck.

Veilguard: what a mess. Unfortunately also the first time the combat itself was fun in a dragon age game.

Lies of P: actually this game was really good like honestly best non-fromsoft soulslike ever I’m just ranking it low because I wish someone would figure out how to make one of these more tight action focused games that take more pages out of the Sekiro/Bloodborne book than the dark souls book, but where you still get to play as a mage.

Echoes of Wisdom: fun, and the concept had more legs than I expected! Unfortunately it just didn’t feel good to play at crucial points. Sometimes I just wanted to kill things with a freaking sword but the sword gauge made that feel wasteful

[ziseviolet]

Hi! I have a question. Im not entirely sure if these belong to chinese fashion because I only ever saw them in uncredited pictures. Theyre very intricate "eye patches", seemingly made from like gold or metal? they cover only one eye and I was wondering if they have a name or if its something made up? thank you for all your work!

Hi, thanks for the question, and sorry for taking ages to reply! (x)

The intricate gold/metal "eye patches" covering only one eye that you see are most likely based on "半面妆/Ban Mian Zhuang" ("Half Face Makeup"), a popular Chinese novel written by 萧十一狼/Xiao Shi Yi Lang and published in 2015. Well-known Chinese gufeng-style illustrator 古戈力/Gu Ge Li provided beautiful artwork for the novel, as seen below (1, 2):

Gu Ge Li's artwork inspired many hanfu photoshoots with ornate eyemasks (1, 2, 3, 4, 5):

These eyemasks are essentially made-up fantasy masks with Chinese elements incorporated into the design. They are not based on historical Chinese masks, which look very different. Thus you can just call them 面具/mianju, which is the general Chinese term for masks.

On a related note, similar types of fantasy masks also appear frequently in Chinese guzhuang (period costume) films & dramas, especially in the wuxia and xianxia genres. As @audreydoeskaren touched on in this post, these masks are typically not historically accurate, but are included for aesthetic effect (like many other elements in guzhuang media).

Below - fantasy masks in Chinese film/dramas. Clockwise from top left: women - Painted Skin: The Resurrection, Legend of Nine Tails Fox, The Empress of China, The Blue Whisper; men - Love and Redemption, Xuan-Yuan Sword: Scar of Sky, The Untamed, Battle Through the Heavens:

Deriving inspiration from art and television, fantasy masks have become a popular accessory for hanfu photoshoots.

For more examples of Chinese masks (both historical & fantasy), please see my masks and eyemask tags.

Hope this helps! ^^

[dangermousie]

I loved this sequence both for what it says about XZ's vast powers and his equally vast loneliness.

He's literally the LAST god standing and his been for ages, and these beings were his family and his friends and we saw he was actually the BABY of the family and honestly, what would it do to someone to be this ancient, this powerful and this alone?

They don't want him to malewife with Shen Li because the world might end but the thing is even if he doesn't, this cannot go on forever, sooner or later a being in this position - all powerful all alone - will lose it - if not over a feisty immortal warrior than just in general and run amuck one way or another. This cannot go on eternally, for anyone.

It's so interesting to me because this is the first time I've seen xianxia do a proper age gap romance, so to speak, in thorough fashion, do it beyond a throwaway "oh such and such a character is ancient" but informing everything and it really really works.