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Xie Lian, in the Spiritual Communication Array: So I appear to have been kidnapped by a calamity…

Mu Qing: Which one?

Feng Xin: How many calamities do you know??

Feng Xin: What does he look like, your highness.

Xie Lian: *Staring at Hua Cheng’s abs*

Xie Lian: Mmmm...sexy?

Mu Qing and Feng Xin: THATS CRIMSON RAIN!!!

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Hua Cheng would probably start a weekly news letter in ghost city just so Xie Lian can have a place to share the interesting things he learns (like remedies for foot pain), since Ling Wen made him feel bad about sharing it in the heavenly telepathic matrix.

I bet the ghosts and creatures would actually really appreciate it too.

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MXTX protags my beloved. Prettyboy table for the win

Bonus page:

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I can’t shake the feeling that Hua Cheng must’ve been so overwhelmed seeing the version of Dianxia he met on that ox cart. Like he would trust, support, and love even the darkest version of Xie Lian imaginable, but the one he ended up meeting, after everything, was gentle, sweet, adorable, delightfully silly, honest, and unguarded, ready to protect the old man driving the ox cart and share his steamed bun with a stranger.

Scenes from many gut-wrenching moments probably flashed before his eyes, yet here was his Dianxia, within reach. And they were just having a chat—not as a redacted and his redacted—just two people on a chance encounter on a beautiful autumn day. Hua Cheng’s heart must’ve felt so full that it was about to burst.

At the same time, he probably wanted so much more than having a casual conversation about the water tyrant. Imagine the amount of self-restraint he had to not just blurt out “where have you been??” “How have you been??” “Give me a list of people and creatures who have ever mistreated you in any way in the past 800 years…”

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happy valentines day!! they're really like this.

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I love that set of official watercolor illustrations so I wanted to draw something inspired by them :')

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Ok but, like, the way that Xie Lian and Hua Cheng are individually the strongest characters of their show, but when it comes to each other they're like daisies?? In the wind?

Like, Hua Cheng, right? One of, if not the strongest ghosts in the entire ghost realm. Always ready to fight. Always prepared. But the second Xie Lian appears

He is grabbed and just FLUNG across the room!

The fact that he didn't stick the landing makes me think he just ragdolled! Bruh ragdolled!

And Xie Lian!

~Just wisped away~

"Hello again :)"

And Xie Lian's got fast reflexes! Like, remember the dude from season one?

Not a problem. Not a single fuck to spare.

But this guy

"~Oh nooo~! I guess I'm slowly getting kidnaaapped!~"

Like, This is intentional! These are moments they both allow to happen!

That is adorable.

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saw this on my tl and oh op is so right

credits to @/melondenden on X

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The Who of Hua Cheng

I am going to venture a guess that I spend more time than at least 99% of the population thinking deeply about Hua Cheng (not that hard but the brain rot is still real).

I find myself turning around and around in my mind the who of Hua Cheng, because TGCF is written from Xie Lian's point of view. We see moments with him, which are keystone moments in Hua Cheng's life for certain, but are brief compared to the rest.

And sometimes I worry that we don't think enough about Hua Cheng as a fully fleshed person. Is he a supreme because of XL? Absolutely he is. But all the rest of the things about him are very much inherently him.

It means that tiny Hong'er was extremely smart even when marked with the curse. And that Hong'er was tenacious too. It meant that Hong'er had martial prowess great enough to ascend, all on his own. In another world (one where he was not born under the Star of Solitude), Hong'er would be a god.

I think it bears mentioning that even in spite of being born under such a curse, all he needed to reach the heights he was destined to reach was the kindness of a single person: Xie Lian.

Was Xie Lian his totem? Absolutely! But the thing about being devout is that it comes from within. Hua Cheng's strength is not something he borrows from Xie Lian. It's not something he depends on Xie Lian for in order to flourish and grow.

And I think that's important.

Hua Cheng is very much his own person. He's made thousands and thousands of choices in his life. Are they choices that he weighs based on what his god would do? Yes, very much. But he does not depend on Xie Lian to make those choices.

He made Ghost City in part to curb the worst instincts of people. And he also made it to give wayward wanderers with nowhere to go a place to call home.

He answers the prayers of children going to his temples over rich folks.

He made a teleportation array that serves half as a prank to people who use it.

All while searching for his vagabond god.

Don't get me wrong, this does not mean that he would not give each and every piece of himself to Xie Lian once the two were reunited. And those other things he did are truly secondary to his vow to love and protect his god, but I don't think we should forget how extraordinary Hua Cheng is, even in the secondary.

Xie Lian fell in love with Hua Cheng so easily because of the person he was. He's clever, and he's funny, and he's kind (even if he denies it), and he's a martial master. He was these things independent of Xie Lian, but because of Xie Lian's moment of kindness, he was also not robbed of sharing those parts of him with the world.

Hua Cheng and Xie Lian truly belong together. Not because Hua Cheng is devoted, but because Hua Cheng is amazing.

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I’ve been told I have an agenda…

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TGCF is a comedy, actually

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Mechanic Kaveh save me. save me Mechanic Kaveh

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Hua Cheng's Very Different Loves

There is often a fundamental misunderstanding of Hua Cheng's love for Xie Lian. The biggest of them was Mu Qing and Feng Xin's assumption at seeing the Cave of Ten Thousand Gods.

They see Hua Cheng as obsessive, dangerous. And given the history with Bai Wuxian, yeah, not entirely in the wrong for that assumption.

It's hard to understand that Hua Cheng is one who has truly separated his devotion from his romantic love for Xie Lian. Because devotion/worship of a god and love of a person are different.

At least until now, the devout and obsessive level of worship that Hua Cheng exhibits is the first type. The type of a religious devotee. And that cave, that's what we see. Hua Cheng did not make the sculptures and the paintings for Xie Lian exactly, he didn't do it with a plan to bring Xie Lian there and ask for praise, he did it because Xie Lian was his totem, the very thing that could center him even at times of extreme suffering to pull through. Religious love is not something that expects reciprocation, it's not something that requires anything of the subject of worship except their existence. And the Hua Cheng of the past 800 years poured his obsessive love into this type of love, the love that he does not have any expectations for.

We know that Hua Cheng also felt the other type of love. His sexual awakening was downright traumatic. Seriously, imagine being fourteen, and having to defend your beloved god from sex demons who are forcing you to realize that your devotion to your god has an edge of desire, all while said god is stabbing himself to keep from acting on the extreme discomfort of sexual urges forced on him by those same damn sex demons. No wonder Hua Cheng is so absolutely freaked out and a little disgusted about harboring that type of love for Xie Lian.

When Hua Cheng finally finds Xie Lian again after 800 years, I fundamentally believe that Hua Cheng would have been content with an existence of watching over and protecting his god from the sidelines. His devotion mattering more than that sliver of self-loathing desire that would never be erased.

The story we got to read though, the one that makes TGCF so special is the way that the other love grows between Xie Lian and Hua Cheng. They enjoy each other's company, enjoy teasing and talking, enjoy the little touches that they share. When Hua Cheng talks about his beloved, he speaks of his romantic love and winning over that person. He speaks of it shyly, because he knows it is something that has to be shared and has to grow naturally. It's what makes their love story so very human, because Hua Cheng treated his religious love and his desirous love as completely separate from each other. And the best part? Xie Lian knows this, understands this, has no doubt about this.

It means that the scene in the cave, where both Feng Xin and Mu Qing mistook Hua Cheng's obsessive devotion for obsessive desire, Xie Lian recognizes correctly.

And Xie Lian reciprocates those romantic feelings.

I like to picture those days that Xie Lian wakes up and finds the other side of his bed empty, then wanders to the Thousand Lights Temple to see Hua Cheng there changing the single white flower in his god's hands, then bowing his head and saying a prayer. Xie Lian rolls his eyes, because well, he's right there, but it's Hua Cheng's ritual, and whether they are husbands, whether they had rough and enjoyable sex the night before, Hua Cheng won't slack on his religious love just because he gets to share romantic love with his husband and god.

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I think it's very significant Hua Cheng's power involves rain because the event that started Xie Lian's suffering was a drought, so it's as if when he emerged to protect him, he said: "if it was wrong for gods to answer prayers for rain, a ghost will. And the heavens will bleed for it".

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Xie Lian is the only one who can gets mighty Hua Cheng off guard

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some of y’all didn’t have a bootleg dvd guy your dad somehow knew growing up and it shows

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🎳💥