#zitan

[chinoiseriene]

GongDeng 宫灯 palace lanterns, also known as court lanterns, are a distinctive type of traditional Chinese lantern and a hallmark of Chinese craftsmanship.

The city of Luoyang in Henan province was especially known for the production of palace and court lanterns. It’s also considered the origin of this craft.

As the name suggests, palace lanterns were initially used in the imperial palace. They are typically made with a delicate wooden frame, adorned with silk gauze or glass, and painted with various decorative patterns. These lanterns are celebrated for their elegance and regal courtly style. Used primarily within the court.

The lanterns in this post are from the Qing Dynasty and are made out of Zitan (red sandalwood)

[fake-married-my-dead-fiance]

Her dress is stunning, her husband is treasonous pissed off, everything is going great

[carmelide]

i know it makes sense for their characters or whatever and that i should just be glad that monarch industry had a happy ending but the fact that wang xuan and xiao qi don't become emperor and empress at the end reallllyyyy pisses me off 😭

[gizkasparadise]

jiwu giving us some real zitan energy in this last arc

bonus shot of his sectmates realizing their newly appointed boss is, in fact, a zitan:

[dangermousie]

This really establishes the theme of the drama that carries through the remaining eps.

Luckily for both Awu and the country, this gentleman is eventually there to take care of things:

In other news, most of my dramas finished (I adore both Phone and Riverside but that's not enough to fill up a schedule) and nothing particularly noteworthy seems to be on the horizon, so it's time to rewatch cdrama that has my n1 drama OTP of all time, The Rebel Princess/Monarch Industry. If you have a competence kink (for both members of the OTP), arranged marriage turned to love, ride or die OTP against the world, etc etc come right in.

Awu's a daughter of a family that produced 12 empresses, as blue blooded as it gets, being pushed as the next crown princess and in love with the emperor's third son, gorgeous but useless Zitan. Xiao Qi is common as dirt peasant turned the best general in a generation, given a royal title for saving the kingdom and looked down on by the blue bloods. Neither of them has any plans to marry the other, but clans and politics and schemes intervene. And from then on, it's sheer gloriousness.

Official MV:

Have this gorgeous fan MV.

My Monarch Industry tag is INSANE in amount of posts (67 pages!!!!) for a reason.

[thegreymoon]

Monarch Industry - Rewatch

Restarting Monarch Industry like I'm not already watching five other shows right now because @jellyfishesandart is an evil influence 😭

But then again, it is true that I can never have enough of Zhou Yiwei on my screen. I love him to bits!

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Ugh, cutiepie! 😭

The irony of her feeling so safe with him, smh.

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Xiao Qi, my beloved 🖤

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I love how impressive this throne looks in the beginning, but then gets progressively duller and more worthless as the show progresses.

There is no respect left for it as a symbol of the nation by the time we get to the end.

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LMAO, oh, Zitan 😅

And I was so ready to love him back when I first watched this because he's just gorgeous 😔 Pity he has no character to match.

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I will never be over the amount of PRESENCE this man has 😭

He's so still and steady, yet he dominates every scene he's in, he just radiates power 🔥🔥

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The power of this 🔥🔥

If the main couple had not been so rock-solid in this, I would have 100% been shipping this!!

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He is the hottest man alive and I'm not taking criticism.

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Oh, Potato, you have no idea how wrong you are 🙄

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So so wrong, all the time, every time.

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LMAO, these idiots 🤣🤣

They were so happy here 😢

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Aww, his shy little smile 🤗

I love him to pieces 🖤

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Such a beautiful man 🖤

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The closing song is just so beautiful 😭

[tovesaiko]

I finished The Rebel Princess / Monarch Industry and here are my Very Deep Thoughts:

Don't get why everyone is into Zitan.

Absolutely get why everyone is into A'Wu.

Don't get why everyone isn't into Xiao Qi.

COSTUME CDRAMA CREATORS I'M BEGGING YOU TO GIVE YOUR MLS FACIAL HAIR, XIAO QI AND WANG SU LOOK SO GOOD IN THE LATER PART OF THE DRAMA.

[joyburble]

Ep 41. I cannot stand the sight of Qian'er or her mother.

This is probably doomed, but really sweet.

Does the Empress Dowager know about the flood manual? It makes more sense if she does, but it's funnier if she doesn't.

I know that this series wasn't allowed to have the same ending as the original novel, and I know in outline what that was, but I'm baffled as to who could actually end up in the hot seat and last more than five minutes. But if it's not Zitan, and it's not our hero, who gets a different ending, who else is left? Wanru as regent for a baby would be thematically plausible at this point, but Zitan somehow surviving the last episode seems more likely, if baffling.

I keep wanting to skip forward, but I don't actually skip that much, because it switches often enough between different bits of the story.

[quanronggallery]

Vintage Chinese Zitan Wood Bagua Abacus w Shelf https://www.invaluable.com/auction-lot/vintage-chinese-zitan-wood-bagua-abacus-w-shelf-396-c-1ac4e93aeb?objectID=179558279&algIndex=upcoming_lots_lotNumber_asc_prod&queryID=ea73d9153730fe667201b47ab7ab044e

[wishingforatypewriter]

Once the construction got underway, Suyin started leaving. The first time she disappeared without word, Baatar had entered an acute state of panic, pacing up and down the campsite in the valley and the halls of the Gaoling estate, politely urging the Beifongs to contact the authorities and report her missing. But Su’s grandparents had merely sat on their zitan wood dais, sipping plum wine, wholly unbothered by the question of her whereabouts. 

“Oh, she does that sometimes, dear,” Lady Poppy said with a sympathetic smile. “She’ll be back when she’s ready.” 

“Like an alley cat when it runs out of food,” Lord Lao grumbled. 

As he continued with his designs of the city proper, Baatar kept one eye on the horizon, waiting for her the way crops await the rain.  

When she returned in her little green jeep more than a week later, there was a massive convoy of platinum following behind her. She walked up to the building site, smiling like a victorious general fresh from battle, and threw her arms around him. 

“Missed me?” she purred into his ear, and Baatar’s collar felt suddenly tight around his neck. 

“Um, Su, w-where did you get all this platinum?” 

“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to.” 

[screaming-at-the-tv]

MY GOODNESS

I don't even ship Awu and Zitan, but I'm still here crying for them 😭

This is how a show should be

[aviewofthejames]

For comparison's sake, note the delicate curve and slight dimensions of the top rails of this pair of Ming yokeback armchairs executed in zitan.

[fake-married-my-dead-fiance]

Worst emperor ever

I know, I know, there are lots of terrible emperors out there in Cdrama land, but This guy is just so utterly pathetic. He's so incompetent it's not even funny. They prevented him from going to war and he had a six month temper tantrum. He doesn't bother to even rule. He murdered his brother to take the throne and he's not even doing anything with it. He's a total dud. The literal baby would be doing a better job even without a regent, at least he'd show up to court (because someone carried him there).

Cannot wait until he dies (he dies right? Please tell me he dies for regicide)

[christylove94]

Everlasting - Part Four - III

Pairing: Dongfang Qingcang/Xiao Lanhua

Chapter Tags: Canon typical violence, hurt/comfort, AU elements

Gulping in each breath, her hands lead the book down to the small platform on an unsteady path. She manages to resist a yawn as she picks it up and reads the shimmering veins flowing through the leaf, perfectly intact. The damage had been extensive. She and Da Mutou had caused a lot of harm with their tugging.

That's not the only damage that's been caused due to our disagreements, she remembers with a wry grin, her eyes drifting across the low table they've shared tea and dessert at many times.

“Little Orchid, were you able to fix the Destiny Book?” Lord Changheng inquires from his seated lotus position about a dozen chi away. 

Her heart kicks the walls of her throat without mercy, her pulse near visible in the wrist of her hand gripping the Destiny Book. She keeps her gaze fixed on the wooden stand attached securely to the platform. 

She gives no answer.

“Little Orchid…?”

My instincts had known, hadn't they? That's why–

“Is there a problem?”

The moment he rises to his feet, she surges to her own, clutching the Destiny Book to her belly. 

He stiffens, eyebrows pinched together, but doesn't move closer. 

Her eyes give a covert search of her surroundings. Seconds pass as sweat beads along the back of her neck trapped underneath her hair. All she needs is time. Now that she's aware, she just needs to give him time.

Lord Changheng opens his mouth–

“No problem!” she insists bright and clear, flapping her hands, wishing to shake away the tension. “I just– I, um… food!” She snatches up a platter from the platform.

Lord Changheng steps towards her in clear puzzlement. “Food?”

Lowered eyes - not so much that she can't see him - puckered bottom lip, slumped shoulders, and pitious tone. She displays her full pout while explaining, “I'm just weak grass, and this Destiny Book was badly damaged. I need more energy to heal it fully.” A remorseful dip to her head tops it off. “Sorry, Changheng.”

At this, his eyebrows lift with the corners of his mouth, revealing a soft, sunny countenance. “I see. And what would you like?”

A chi away now. Icicles stab down her spine, slicing through every nerve they encounter. A breath struggles its way out of her. “I-I, um—”

Her chin is pinched between thumb and finger, lifting her face to his. His expression has not changed, but a frantic drumming in her gut tells her she has failed to deceive him. 

Whatever cloying words he tells her are lost to her ears in the rush of adrenaline flooding her veins. The book is shifted to one hand. She clenches her eyes shut. 

Swing.

The sturdy platter of zitan wood shatters against the imposter's face as easily as the twin Da Motou broke. 

In the wake of plinking wood and his shocked shout, she runs. 

Pillars and railing flash by her sides. Her magic builds in panicked preparation. A waterfall pressing against a dam. 

Opulent blankets, pillows, and drapes fill her mind. His bed chambers. 

She can't make it. 

They had ridden Shangque when they went to the Cangyan Sea. Of course she can't teleport there. 

But—

A cool demand resounds from all sides.

“Hand her over.”

Her feet slip from under her. Pain explodes through her knees, radiating outward in repetitious waves. 

“Da Mutou!” 

Her body skids. The world dips under her. Sharp blows thundering down her side and torso in her tumble. Spilled over the brief steps, her body splays out to a halt. 

“Da Mutou, I'm here!” The copper tasting cry feels as if it's punched from her shaking form.

“Search all you want, Dongfang Qingcang,” an unfamiliar cadence that unsettles and chills taunts with a satisfied chuckle. “This is the Thousand Dreamland. You're more likely to be trapped in a false dream than ever finding the true one. But even if you do manage to find the real fairy you seek… you'll be too late.”

The air displaces beside her being filled in by a man in the subtle hues of a bird’s plumage. “Did you hear that?” 

Her throat is near crushed, her rapid breaths restricted. Vision starry black around the edges, her body floats upward with his grip, limp aside from her bone-tight hold on the Destiny Book. 

A face obscured by an obsidian mask, open over a mouth with a strip of liquid crimson down the right side, grins.

“He'll be too late.”

“H-he'll... ss-save… me…!” A costly croak of the last of her air, she is aware, but the need to defend will not be suppressed. 

“Save you?” Mocking mirth saturates his words. Her right wrist is ensnared, jerked up to eye level. Her scraped knuckles ooze the color from her fierce grip. “He's here for this.” The hiss slips through gritted teeth.

The delicate bones in her wrist creak, threatening collapse. Stars swim across her vision. 

It feels as if she slips into mortal time. What must be weeks pass in seconds as her body twitches in fading struggle. 

A roar of pressure squeezes against her ears from the world being torn asunder.

Icy cerulean. Snapping azure. Undeniable danger. 

In the haze of her view over his shoulder, cold, biting fury blaze in a wild halo. Her drooping, flickering vision is drawn to it as a moth is to a flame.

But the frantic whooshing in her ears begins to slow. Precious sound follows. 

“Impo… ble! …ou sh… …le…!”

Electric blue chases the encroaching darkness into oblivion. Air inflates her lungs so forcibly tears well upward and tip over. Full bodied shudders follow each gasping breath down the throbbing ache of her throat. It takes several moments for her to find the strength to peel open her eyes. 

Deep pools of dusky brown observe her in a cool fashion, the pinched fringes of his features giving away his concern. 

She feels propped up over his legs and tucked close into the calming heat of his chest. The palm of his hand cradles her head, fingers massaging and feeding his spirit energy into her meridians. His liquid fire racing to mend the worst of her hurts. 

The floor would be her cradle if what everyone else believed about him was true. 

It's almost too much, what she feels in this instant swirling inside her. Too much to absorb. Overwhelming, like seeing that Fate Mark on Lord Changheng.

But this feels infinitely better.

Da Mutou's attention breaks away, leading her gaze to the right.

The masked man is midair, his wicked blade already past the apex of his swing.

A silver-white sword swathed in blue flames cuts through the air, shattering at its peak. Each miniscule shard seems to blink out of existence, and in their place the masked man crashes to the ground, riddled with bleeping wounds. 

A smattering of heartbeats is all the exchange took. 

Her lips move the barest hint, her words a mere whisper. “Da… Da Mutou.”

“You seem to be the wooden head here.” The response is whip fast with his focus remaining on the masked man trembling upon the ground.

A denial would be pointless seeing as she agrees.

She shifts her mouth into a pout instead.

Her upper body is leaned with care against a thick beam where she is left to soak in the vastness of his spirit energy cycling through her. 

Da Mutou begins to approach the masked man in the center of the fractured greeting room with the slow, assured gait of a prowling predator. 

“You are the lord of Hashi City. What do you want with the Destiny Book?” He stops before the fallen lord, looking down upon him. “Why are you wearing a mask?” 

She does not know much about warfare, but the haughty defiance the masked man displays through his bleeding sneer is transparent. He is a cornered animal. 

“Those too hard for you? Well, how about this one?” His right hand wraps around a flare of Hellfire that reforms into his long, imposing sword. “How dare you hurt one of my own?” 

The frost bitten undertones to the smooth accusation is met with a derisive laugh.

“One of your own?” Hashi City's Lord huffs out, grinning. “Rumors must be true. Who knew the Moon Supreme preferred to have his services performed by lowly fair—”

The masked man gags as his body lurches into the air by the band of Hellfire cinched tight around his throat from a mere tilt of Da Mutou's head. 

Warning ripples through her senses akin to those which trail along the fine threads of a spider's web. 

Da Mutou lifts his left hand, fingers gradually parting in a vertical angle.

The masked man's feet kick in weak spasms, his mouth opening grotesquely wide—

Gasping, she clamps her hands over her ears. Jerks her head away—

And comes face to face with the familiar sight of an unfurling, spiked whip.

Her eyes snap shut. 

The ground rumbles underneath her. 

For a time, she hears… nothing. 

Tense for several moments longer, she realizes it's because her heart is pounding hard and fast, drowning out all else. 

A yelp propels from her chest at the touch to her shoulder.

Eyes popping wide, she spots Da Mutou squatting in front of her, the source of the touch. Throwing a frightened look past him, she sees no sign of a writhing man, gushing blood from his mouth. No sign of the Hashi City woman either.

Hoisted up without much notice, her body nestles into his chest on instinct. She doesn't realize how much she's shaking until he begins to stride towards the entrance of Arbiter Hall and her fear begins to slowly seep from her veins. 

“Were you really… going to… cut out his tongue?” The words feel slurred in her mouth like she's had too much liquor.

“I was.” His walk is smooth, rhythmic, lulling her eyes closed. “For what he implied of you. You have a reputation to uphold after all.”

A wisp of a smile manages to pull at her lips. She doesn't know if it's from the twisted humor he injected into his words, or the fact that he remembered her scolding from the very first night he stayed at Arbiter Hall. 

She can tell even without opening her eyes that he's made his way down the last set of steps from the faint tinkling of the visitor bell in the wind. 

He takes to the air in an easy bound. “There's always next time,” he mumbles, though she's unsure if she imagined it. 

The cracks and tears and vicious pain have faded to dull aches thanks to Da Mutou's spirit energy. But still, it feels as if she could sleep for a week. 

So, she tucks her head into the comforting scent at his neck, presses her hand with the Destiny Book over the throbbing beat of his heart.

Then sleeps.

[thegreymoon]

Monarch Industry - Rewatch

So many dramas to watch and I'm choosing to continue rewatching this. Zhou Yiwei is perfection and I love this show so much.

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Don't cry, Awu, Zitan is worthless and useless, as you'll soon find out.

You are about to marry a much better man.

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LMAO, shut up 😂

You ran off on your wedding night. How is that for losing face?

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This idiot.

Poor Grand Princess, you have wasted your efforts on his miserable ass.

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The way she just killed all those people with no remorse so that Awu could marry Zitan.

These nobles really thought everyone was disposable and had no concept of the value of human life whatsoever as long as they got what they wanted.

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Oh, Princess 😢

You are betting on the wrong man here.

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Oh, Awu 😢

His worthless ass is not coming.

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He may be a villain but he is speaking truths.

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And in broad daylight, this loser appears.

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I love how, once she was done waiting for his useless ass, she just eliminated him from her life 😅