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ultfreakme · 3 months

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Danmei ask, what are your top 5 (or top 7) favorite moments from MDZS? Also, can I ask why you love those 3 (JC, WWX , XXC)?

(Riki, I'm so glad when found out you also love Jiang Cheng. You must know how many haters on his character in tumblr and twitter. Like, I was blocked 4 times by MDZS lover blog, when they knew I love Jiang Cheng.)

I love reading your MDZS/ SVSSS crossover, they're so in character.....And yes, SQQ must love Sukuna and Jogo if he ever read JJK...

Thanks for the ask Anon!!

Top 7 moments:

When we find out the Jiang Cheng sacrificed himself to the Wens to save Wei Wuxian. It was dropped so casually and I had to backtrack and go "wait, wait, WAIT! DISCUSS IT PLEASE!!"

The juniors in the Yi City arc, they were so adorable, I loved reading them putting on a brave face and investigating.

Wei Wuxian murdering the crap out of Wen Chao with his sexy undead ladies. Him and Jiang Cheng together torturing him while Lan Wangji was sent out and it's like, LWJ is confused, shocked, and horrified.

The scene where Wei Wuxian's roasting Jin Guangshan at the conference post-war and everyone's scandalized. I love it when Wei Wuxian gets bitchy.

Jiang Cheng's intro scene in the donghua where he emerges from the shadows of that tree, pushing aside the leaves. That's so hot of him.

Wei Wuxian covered in blood in the second siege of Burial Mounds and Lan Wangji is defending him. That scene's so cool and romantic in all its iterations. The donghua went above and beyond and made it seem like a wedding.

Jiang Cheng giving Zidian to Jin Ling ;_; It hurts me. It's so much worse knowing that MXTX was planning on killing Jin Ling soon after to really hurt Jiang Cheng.

Reasons I like:

Jiang Cheng-

He's so complicated! You can't immediately look at him and say he's the good guy or the bad guy. I personally think he leans more towards the good guy category.

He's the perfect opposite of Wei Wuxian, he's not a genius cultivator like wwx, he had to work for every bit of progress he made. He started off simply wanting to keep his family together and at peace, but the war happened and his priorities shifted. He's duty-bound, he's always fighting and scraping to be recognized but no one ever does. He wanted so bad to help wwx, but duty made it so that he was forced to pick between his sect and wwx. Forever chained, closed off.

He's jealous and vicious and so, so angry. I get it, I understand the worst parts of him and relate to it.

Wei Wuxian-

Again, super complicated as a person. Wronged at every turn. He wanted to do good and protect people, and for that he kept sacrificing himself over and over again with little value given to himself as a person. He's got his sharp edges and cruelty too, and I feel like people often forget that Wei Wuxian's traumas and his lack of self-appreciation and value on himself show in ugly and vicious ways.

His story obviously shows a key message of MDZS, which is that when people sacrifice themselves thinking that they're protecting their loved one, they only hurt them in another way. I understood his desire to do good, protect people, but there's no one to stand at his side. The loneliness and fear that comes with fucking up so bad that no one even tries to hear you out, no one's listening no matter how loud you shout.

Xiao Xingchen:

He's like Wei Wuxian but 100% times worse and more self-sacrificial. Too trusting, too good, and everyone kept taking advantage of that without bothering to guide him or be honest with him. Like legit, no one told him what they were truly thinking.

I love that xxc wants to be a good person, i hate that he was ruined for it. God I really wanted him to have a happy ending because he's just, he's so NICE. In a world filled with betrayal and deceit, xxc wanted to spread goodness. And yet.

AAHHHHHH

I think these characters made me see the point of MDZS in a very clear way, or in a way that impacted me most. So they're my faves.

Being a Jiang Cheng liker is a struggle! I was getting into MDZS even before the donghua started airing, like around 2018 and back then Jiang Cheng hate was so bad. I kept waiting year after year for the hate to go down but it just got worse the more popular MDZS got. The misunderstandings built up too. I got black and got into a million arguments too ;_; We have to stick together!!!

i have so many thoughts about Jiang Cheng specifically because, okay I read and watched everything about 3 years ago, so I don't remember much other than my fav, so I'm always thinking about everything he did.

nbsdhfb SQQ's monster-loving ass would go gaga for Sukuna. Four armed man wrecking people??? Yes sir! (side note; big tall powerful man who is called king who is only nice to his close servant and confidante???? SQH come get your boy!)

#riki asks #mxtx #svsss #mdzs #mo dao zu shi #scum villain self saving system

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thisisallthehattersfault · 10 months

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Thoughts on the Sect Leader Wen Sizhui AU

The Sunshot campaign fails. Meng Yao and Wen Qing together manage to convince Wen Ruohan not to kill the various sect leaders and instead to subjugate them. Some are allowed to keep leading their sects as vassal sects to the Wen. Others are completely absorbed into the Wen. All are forced to share any secret knowledge or techniques they may have.

Jiang Yanli and Jin Zixuan marry, but are kept in Qishan to be used as hostages to ensure to good behavior of Jiang Cheng, Wei Wuxian, and Jin Guangshan.

(Jin Guangshan thinks he has Wen Ruohan’s good graces because he barely took part in the war and immediately surrendered, but actually Wen Ruohan is fond of Meng Yao and, as a result, thinks Jin Guangshan is trash.)

Nie Huiasang is kept to ensure the good behavior of Nie Mingjue. Lan Wangji is kept to ensure the good behavior of Lan Xichen.

With both Wen Chao and Wen Xu dead, Wen Ruohan has only one living heir: His grandson, Wen Xu’s only child, Wen Yuan.

Once again Meng Yao and Wen Qing manage to convince Wen Ruohan that the hostages could be valuable as teachers -- they’re all members of the gentry who are either skilled cultivators or (in Jiang Yangli’s case) talented administrators, and all of them have knowledge that will be useful for the heir of... basically the entire world.

They’re all always being watched by Wen disciples, but nonetheless a-Yuan becomes close to his various teachers. As he grows older, he starts to notice their fear and the way they’re all treated, and decides he doesn’t like that.

It takes years of careful maneuvering, but eventually basically all of the guards around Wen Yuan and the sect leaders are the ones who follow Wen Ning and Wen Qing, which allows everybody to have a little bit more freedom of movement.

When Wen Yuan gets a little bit older, Wen Ruohan demands all of the sect heirs his age be sent to Qishan to be raised as his personal attendants.

Junior Quartet are the main squad obviously but there are other kids too.

Sizhui is still named Sizhui but this time it’s in honor of his father and uncle, since I stan Family Man Wen Ruohan

Sizhui does not want to kill his grandfather! Wen Ruohan is good to him! But.

Wen Sizhui, his teachers, his servants, and the Wen disciples under Wen Ning, all ultimately collaborate to stage a coup. In the process, Wangxian get together, Yunmeng siblings reconcile, Jin brothers become besties, and the Junior Quartet go full poly.

Sizhui works to help the other sects re-establish themselves, but by now there’s so much weirdness that a lot of them just... kind of merge. Lan Wangji is the second young master of the Lan Sect but he’s also an honored teacher and the defacto father figure of the Wen Sect Leader so his Lan robes have little gold fire decals alongside the silver clouds. Wei Wuxian is Jiang but he’s also kind of Wen. The Jin and Ouyang remain vassal sects to the Wen so that Jin Ling and Zizhen can marry Sizhui. Lan Xichen ends up having his own kid (3zun endgame?) so Jingyi isn’t the heir anymore and he can also live with his husbands.

Wen Qing opens an all-sect medical school.

Wen Ning marries Qin Su and they have half a dozen little doe-eyed babies that have their Wei-Shushu and their Lan-Shushu wrapped around their little fingers.

#MDZS #The Untamed #Wen Yuan #Lan Sizhui #I'm not tagging everyone or every ship #just. Here. Have this.#Feel free to use this as a prompt and run with it in whatever direction you want #lord knows I'm unlikely to ever actually write it

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mqfx · 6 months

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id love to hear your thoughts on jyl! freudian or otherwise, with however many mentions of soup that you prefer 🥺🤲

just saw this :0 well i wouldn't say that i have many intelligent thoughts about jyl anymore especially since i don't really get the chance to talk about mdzs / cql much so i'm afraid i'll have to disappoint you on this count (which makes me a hypocrite i know)

but i did go insane below this line so watch out!

but i will say again what i said a few weeks back about us (fandom, society--you choose) missing out on a broader richer storytelling experience (?) when we continue to look over women's stories to get to the "more interesting" men because "well the author made more content about them so there's more to work with". not gonna belabor this point bc many have already pointed out that people will come up with all sorts of elaborate headcanons to talk about mr. blorbo who showed up in the back for ten seconds but nary a word to spare for the women who did quite a lot of narrative heavy lifting. did you know that i literally found a fic where wen chao becomes a ghost and gets together with qi rong in the underworld? do you see the same effort given to women with a similar level of narrative importance or prominence?

in this case part of it IS the fault of mxtx; more named men have died in mdzs than there are named women characters in it altogether (and even then, most of those women died too!). let's count:

women: wen qing, granny wen, jiang yanli, yu ziyuan, luo qingyang (mianmian), baoshan sanren, cangse sanren, a-qing, madam jin, jinzhu and yinzhu, meng shi (jgy's mom), qin su (jgy's wife). i bolded the ones who are dead by the end of the series (total: 13 women, 11 of whom are dead)

"important" men who died: wei changze, jiang fengmian, jin guangshan, jin zixuan, jin zixun, jin guangyao, jin rusong (child), su she, wen chao, wen zhuliu, wen ruohan, wen xu, wen ning (came back), song lan, xiao xingchen, xue yang, nie mingjue, wei wuxian (came back), mo xuanyu (total dead: 19, or 17 if you don't count the resurrected, 16 if you don't count the child)

13 total women characters vs let's say 16 dead men. and i'm sure i missed a few (<- nearly forgot xue yang) but who cares right now. what does this say about mxtx's priorities as a writer, or at the very least how women figure in her imagination?

''but charlie! they had a great impact on the narrative!" this is true. without meng shi's suffering there would be no raison d'etre for jin guangyao. without baoshan sanren's teachings there would be no xiao xingchen and song lan's tragedy, and no a-qing means we wouldn't even have known. no cangse sanren means no wei wuxian means no story at all. no wen qing = no core transfer. no jiang yanli = no jin ling, no yunmeng brothers, no heart to tether them from falling off the edge of morality (both have committed heinous acts in war regardless but jiang yanli represents for them why they had to do it. she's their home and their family that they fought to protect--and for what!) i could go on with each one, but my point is that if you take even one of these women out of the story, it all falls apart, right?

so why don't i hear anything about them?

and because you asked and i love you, let's focus on jiang yanli here: WHY is she more often than not excluded or otherwise glossed over in all the myriad discussions about how tragic the yunmeng brothers are? was she not also their sibling, their family? did she not also suffer the war and the near-total wipeout of her sect? the death of her husband? she DID but no one seems to give a shit about her unless it's to fucking call her SOUP as if that's the only thing she did!

no paragaph-long popular elegiac posts on her experiences and the incredible fortitude it might have taken not only to withstand all that but to do so with nothing but forgiveness? (speaking of forgiveness: that she forgive jin zixuan at all? out of unwavering love????) because it's not easy to stay kind in regular real-life conditions let alone what she had to face, on top of which was the daily terror that she might lose the last three people in her family she depended on as a non-powerful woman in a misogynistic society. how much of this was because mxtx couldn't be assed to develop her character, and how much of it is actually because despite what mxtx might have written, most people would not even notice because she's a woman?

the thing with interpreting fictional works or talking about characters is that you can't accurately pinpoint how much of the character was authorial intent, how much is your projection, and how much was a happy accident. what makes the curtains blue? i could just as easily say that "jiang yanli was the strongest character in mdzs because unlike the men who used their pain to justify their descents into crimes, heinous acts, and corruption, she (who had suffered equally or worse) managed to remain steadfast to her principles" as i could "jiang yanli remained static as a character because mxtx couldn't think of a way to develop her, or otherwise didn't give a shit about her role aside from sacrificial lamb for wei wuxian's and jiang cheng's pain".

but we can't even get to those goddamn discussions when people refuse to take her as seriously as they take their fucking war criminal beeboos so i'd be wasting everyone's FUCKING TIME

#hewwo #asks #anonymous #long post #mdzs #and don't get me wrong. i love those beeboos too and i'm not innocent of the ''woobifying some guy'' charges #but i do wish we could talk more about those women. and without fanonizing them into Strong Competent Woman or Mother archetypes

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mostlikelytofangirl · 3 months

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I took forever to do this, but I'm sorta back to my groove, so sorry for taking this long orz.

Anyways, I was tagged by @wishthefish to find paragraphs in my WIPs with the words pathetic, wet and ink. And by @little-meowyao with the words song, hand and glass

Ok I had to cheat a bit bc none of my WIPs had three of these words, so I included paragraphs from works I've already posted, but I guess that unless some of these are pretty damn obvious, you won't know which is which so there's that lol

Pathetic

“Only you could have seen my downfall when everybody else saw my glory, including myself. You, who had seen how easily someone can fall from grace. You were always so clever, Yao’er. So surprising; so, so… extraordinary.” It took a moment for Wen Ruohan to notice that the choked sounds were not coming from the body on the floor. A crazed chuckle escaped him as his voice broke. In contrast to his previous outburst, now his words were mellow; his thumbs stroking the wounds he had inflicted on the boy’s face with gentleness. “I would have given you what you desired… I would have given you Jin Guangshan for you to do as you pleased, like I gave you Nie Mingjue. I would have given you Lanling after I conquered it. I-I would… you would have been my heir… I…” There was no mistaking that last pathetic whimper as no one’s other than his own, when his throat contracted too much for words to be enunciated.

Wet

It was a mess, it was uncoordinated and wet and hot and desperate, and was most definitely leaving them both dizzy with how intoxicating this other person could be.

Ink

Meng Yao dropped the brush, it didn’t even register in his mind the big ink stain in his report. He stared at his superior in disbelief, tuning to Zewu-jun only to find the man with a placid smile. He looked back at Chifeng-zun, and the man was fixing him with an intense look. He meant it, of course he did. He was offering Meng Yao the chance of a lifetime! There would be no way his father would deny him if he had backing from someone like Sect Leader Nie!

Song

Which was unfortunate, to say the least, since he had just altered the accursed song!

Hand

Meng Yao hadn’t dared to raise from his bowing position, but a big hand on his head startled him and had him gazing up. He could finally get a good look at that man, and he had to agree with his mother: the golden fabric and threads of his rich attire shimmered to the light and gave him an almost ethereal glow, brightening his handsome features and long hair, shining with aromatic oils. He had a gentle smile on his lips, a vermillion dot on his forehead, and every piece of jewelry was pure gold. He was tall, elegant and powerful. He was magnificent.

Glass

They entered the apartment complex, and were welcomed by a wide lobby, all in white and glass with a big crystal chandelier. It was sparkly enough to make Jin Ling follow it with his eyes and open his mouth wide. There went the pacifier.

I tag @unfortunatelycake, @jgydidnothingwrong, @thatswhatsushesaid and @thebiscuiteternal or anyone who wishes to do this with the words shadow, pet and dance.

#tagged #mdzs #sorry again for taking forever T-T #life has had it out for me for a couple months #but it seems to be giving me a lil break rn

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ssuminshan-official · 1 year

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Payback~~

Zixuan: *fanning himself*

Yao: *relaxing while Su she groomed his tail*

Jintang: Huangdi.....ehem, two Huangdis. Your tea.

Zixuan: thank you very much.

Yao: thanks.

Yao: Shanshan, you're so amazing. You're doing a good job.

Su she: *bhlush* thank you, Yaoyao.

Xue yang: *chewing on some candy* Jiggybuns.

Yao: yangyang.

Zixuan: excuse me? You have your people calling you by nicknames? And not by Huangdi?

Xue yang: I can call Jiggy however I want!! Peacock!!

Yao: because they're my besties, Zish.

Other than my team dimple, I'm down to earth with everyone.

I think that your attendants should give you a nickname too.

Zixuan: ohh. How does Dearest Huangdi sound?

Yao: *laughs and nods*

Xue yang: Jiggybun what about you and that peacock...... I mean zIxUaN Huangdi's loser good-for-nothing, deadbeat, womanizer dad?

Mo xuanyu: Jin guangshan!

Yao and Zixuan: *bursting out in laughter*

Zixuan: he's renting Jinlintai from us.

Yao: we inherited it, so we thought of letting him rent it out from us.

Extra revenue for our empire.

Mo xuanyu: lol you did what?!!

Yao: remember your extra allowance? That was from guangshan's rent.

Zixuan: oh come on. He gave us childhood trauma. And mistreated our moms, plus other unknown women.

Mo xuanyu: you're so amazing! I'm so blessed to have brothers like you!

Xue yang: ahahaahahhaah. So guangshit is renting from you two!!! Oh gosh!

I wonder how he reacted.

Zixuan: he cursed.

Yao: then cried because he's going to lose money.

But his tears were only soiling up our rugs.

Zixuan: so sadly we had to get it replaced.

Yao: even his clothes belongs to us.

Mo xuanyu: what about madam Jin?

Yao: we did nothing to her.

Su she: and what about Jinling?

Zixuan: He's living with me. And now is Ru Lan Wang zi. He also stays with Jiang cheng.

Xue yang: like you saved everyone from guangshan.

Zixuan: exactly.

Yao: isn't our gorgeous peacock emperor amazing?

Zixuan: isn't our splendid fox emperor amazing?

Xue yang: you two are divas.

*clapping* but heroes too!

Su she: where's stinky Zixun?

Zixuan: *laughs* he's my gardener.

Yao: what?! That's hilarious.

Zixuan: also he sweeps the steps of Jinlintai on weekends.

Mo xuanyu: oh my.

Yao: lovely.

Zixuan: he bullied my little bro.

I must do something about it right?

Yao: aww.

Yao: anyways, speaking of which. Aren't we supposed to collect money?

Zixuan: *sips tea* ask someone to do it, yaoyao.

Yao: let's visit him in person. *smile* and you know. Make ourselves comfortable.

Zixuan: ooo. Yaoyao. So devious.

Yao: thank you, Zish.

Xue yang: so is guangshit an emperor?

Zixuan: *spits out tea*

Jintang: *wipes mouth*

Yao: he doesn't have an imperial bone in his body, yangyang.

My A-niang was once a hulijing empress, but she was denounced as a prostitute.

Zixuan: and mine, a.k.a. Madam Jin was the peacock spirit empress, but she denounced it when she got married.

Sadly in Lanling, women weren't allowed to work or show strength.

However that has been changed, and now there are more female cultivators.

Poor Mianmian had to struggle though, but unfortunately left.

Xue yang: kind of strange how it happened twice. Lol.

Yao: Yea. Now he's just a clan leader. Well. Was.

Zixuan: when A-ling comes of age, he'll become the Jin sect leader, and I'll gift him a tiny empire of his own.

Mo xuanyu: so is there anything special?! These beings love to find significance in everything.

Yao: oh yes. The imperial expression.

He's golden + lineage + qualities.

Zixuan: and he's dimples + qualities + lineage too.

Xue yang: not the dimples again. Lol.

Yao: *laughs*

Zixuan: I didn't like how he treated my siblings so I planned to protect them, as well as use my potential to build my own empire.

Yao: same!

Zixuan: right. And A-Su lives with me. She's A-li's bestie.

But she has her own mansion.

Yao: that's so good to hear.

Yao: ah, I think we should go now.

We're getting late.

Zixuan: right. Let's go.

Yao: Hou, please arrange a caravan.

Hou: yes Huangdi.

Yao: team dimple, you comin'?

Su she: of course!

Xue yang: I want to see how badass Jiggy is!!!!!

Mo xuanyu: definitely!

Yao: great. Make that two~~

Xue yang: Jiggy, Jiggy, Jiggy. We're not princesses. Not even divas like you two. We'll pull up on our swords!

Yao: hahaha. Fine.

Zixuan: when am I a diva?!

Xue yang: when aren't you a diva.

Zixuan: hmpf!

~~~~

Hulijings: *surrounding the place*

Peacocks: *biting cultivators who try to stop them*

Yao and Zixuan: *sit on the Jin throne*

Zixuan: why are you shocked? Aren't you going to greet us? Ill mannered! *opens fan furiously*

Yao: should I use my golden strings to punish them?!

Zixuan: that may be the last resort!

Jin sect members: greetings.

Yao: where's guangshan.

*silence*

Yao: xue yang, darling. Can you drag him out?!

Xue yang: yea.

Guangshan:*runs in* landlords, landlords. I'm here!

Ugh bastard child we meet again.

Zixuan, hold on I got your money.

Yao: who are you calling bastard child.

Certainly not your landlord. Who give you a roof over your head.

Zixuan: you must pay both of us, remember. Have you forgotten?

Xue yang: his poor old brain. It slipped him!

Jgs: how dare you let your nasty hulijings run all over my place!!!

Yao: our place.

Ours as in mine and Zixuan's

Jgs: nothing belongs to you! Yao!!

Yao: *saunters, and rests his fan under jgss chin* Huangdi.

Jgs: *deliberately sneezes on Yao*

Yao: agh!!! Ew!! *walks away furiously*

Su she: *wipes him up.* relax, Huangdi, relax.

Zixuan: so much trouble to pay us? So bad.

Jgs: I'm fed up of paying you and that bastard! I can't even remember his name for a second!

Yao: *smiles ominously.*

*pins him on the floor with guqin strings*

Jgs: hey! Untie me!!!

Yao: *sits and opens fan*

Su she: *massaging his arm*

I'll help calm you.

He doesn't know your rage.

Xue yang: *unsheaths sword*

Zixuan: someone, get me some tea.

Jintang: sure Huangdi.

Yao: former sect leader. Do you like perfume?

Jgs: cut the small talk and get out!! I'll push you down the stairs again!

Mo xuanyu: the audacity.

Yao: answer the question.

Xue yang: *glaring mischievously while caressing his Jiangzai*

Jgs: yea. I do like perfume.

Yao: good.

My hulijings.

Hulijing bunch *in their fox form: *gathering up, and waiting anxiously for their leader's instruction*

Yao: fart in his face, and give him some perfume.

With pleasure, Huangdi.

Yao: lovely.

Jgs: what?!!

Yao: you said that you love perfume. So you got perfume.

Jgs: you little lowlife! I knew I shouldn't have let you into the Jin sect. But I just wanted to use you!! I have never accepted you!

Yao: *tightens strings* I realized that I didn't need to be accepted by you!

Jgs: bastard!

Yao: *strings starting to let out steam while his eyes turned a shiny gold* call me that again, and I'll cook you with my strings right in front of everyone!!

Jgs: that's what you are!

Yao: *stops heating up his guqin strings* you can't improve, can you?

I have only stopped because my beloved hulijings may get burnt.

Jgs: you only care about them?

Yao: yes. Have you ever cared about me? Or Xuanyu? Or A-Su

Mo xuanyu: ah, Yao gege. The love of my life.

Jgs: why should I care about outside children!

Zixuan: you better pay us double the amount of money.

Jgs: why?!!

Zixuan: you can't ask an emperor why.

Jgs: *cries* fineeeee. But what if I go bankrupt!

Zixuan: you won't. Because the sect is still running.

Jgs: I'm not thinking of those pests! I'm thinking about me and my expenses.

Zixuan: how selfish.

Yao: then you'll become a tea leaf farmer. That's all. *smile*

Jgs: what power do you two have?!!

Zixuan: we can fire you.

Yao: we even own your clothes, lol.

Jgs: *crying* oh gosh! I'm done for!

I should have kept it in my pants.

Jgs: and who told me to go around with multiple women! But, but I love women so much......*sobs*

Zixuan: what do you like about them?

Jgs: their shape. And beauty. Nothing elseeeee.

They got to be a little dumb too.

Yao: disgusting!

Xue yang: I won't spare him for nothing.

Zixuan: I'm surprised once again.

Yao: *sighs* well. I'm going to my old room to take a bath. Minshan, come with me.

Su she: sure.

And yes, we have packed extra clothes, just incase you guys spend the night.

Yao: lovely.

Jgs: so you're just going to leave me tied here?!!!

Yao: yea. Why not?

Yao: maybe. If you say, my marvelous Yao Huangdi, then maybe I'll untie you.

Jgs: never!!!

Yao: well stay tied, eat some floor.

Xue yang: and smell some farts!!!

~~~ Hours after.

Yao: *entering with Su she* I'm back.

Zixuan: finally, yaoyao. I was getting bored.

Yao: oh no.

Jgs: do you think that if you untie me, I'll give you two your rent money.

Zixuan: pardon him for not respecting you.

Yao: alright then. *releases strings*

Zixuan: *sighs* cultivators. They're so hard sometimes.

Jintang: *massaging Zixuan's arm*

Jgs: here you go. Half a million taels each.

Yao: thank you.

Zixuan: would you give any to A-Yu?

Yao: I think you should pay him too.

Jgs: no way.

Zixuan: don't let us throw you out.

Jgs: fine. Half a million for that child too.

Yao: excellent. Tata.

Zixuan: see you next month.

@verycatbluebird

#jin guangyao #jin zixuan #su she #meng yao #mdzs #dimpledlianfang #su minshan #mo dao zu shi #xue yang #mo xuanyu #the huli jing emperor

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sheadre · 2 years

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Lady of Darkness (WWX x Reader) Part Three

Summary: One evening, when Yiling already went to rest for the night, one Wei Wuxian is restlessly staring out the window of the inn when he spots a woman walk down the empty street. That woman sings beautifully, her form enveloped in darkness as she walks. But who could that woman be? What does she want here?

Word count: 2290

Warnings: mentions of blood, mentions of violence, angst

A/N: Yes, I came back, I'm alive! But not for long, haha ^^' I still have to finish my thesis so I'm gonna go back MIA for a while! However, I will def continue once I handed in every paper to my uni and you will be bombarded with a tone of ideas I had while I wasn't active here! Lots of love! <3

Part One - Part Two

Wen Xuan stood by the lotus pods on Burial Mounds as she watched Wei Wuxian pluck the seeds out of one of the plants. It has been a few months since she first met him. Life here was tranquil for a while, however, ever since Wei Wuxian went to the banquet in Lan Ling, it was like everything was going downhill.

She kept warning him that living a life like this could lead to his demise sooner than later. It seemed that all her words meant nothing to him and were thrown out the window the second they left her lips. They no longer played around with challenges and spent their time arguing. Wen Xuan missed those times to be honest but she knew that if she didn’t try her best to warn him and keep him safe, then she would be a bad friend.

A friend…

Nowadays, she wished that she could be just a simple woman, living an ordinary life, getting engaged and married eventually, finding love and fulfillment in simpler things. A-Yuan noticed how she no longer was singing unconsciously while doing her duties, making her realize that maybe she had more problems than she thought she had. Looking at Wei Wuxian, she felt a strange longing in her heart, a fondness and warmth. A smile always gracing her lips whenever she spotted him, but now… now she was biting her lip in worry, her heart pounding against her ribcage heavily.

The elders were resting, only Wen Qing was around, cutting herbs when she stepped outside the cave. Wen Xuan’s worry only grew each day as she knew that most people wanted Wei Wuxian dead. She saw the good he was trying to do against the injustice, but sometimes, it was just not the right time to be playing the hero. Her heart melted the ice around itself ever since she met him. Somehow this one person was capable of making her see how the world is so vast, filled with many different colors and possibilities.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

Wei Wuxian looked up with a confused expression at her. Her gaze however, stayed on his form unwavering.

“I’m worried about you, Wei Ying.”

His name fell from her lips with exasperation, a tiredness that filled her soul. She tried to be as nonchalant as possible, knowing that taking things too seriously or letting Wei Wuxian know that she was indeed serious about a topic would only make him skittish.

Wei Ying stood to his feet, his eyes narrowing at her.

“You don’t want me to go to my nephew’s birthday.” he huffed, irritated. They had a fight over the topic already, Wen Qing joining in as well. Cornering her friend however, did not work out the way she thought it would. Wei Ying felt a million miles away from her ever since the arguments started and Wen Xuan was growing desperate in trying to reach him.

“I have a reason. Do you think they will not try to harm you? Jin Guangshan cannot wait to take that damned Stygian Tiger seal from you! It became everyone’s obsession!” she reasoned which rather sounded like pleading.

“I am completely safe! I can protect myself!” he yelled at her, fed up with how many times the two girls tried to stop him. His eyes flickered in red but Wen Xuan was not someone to back down against any man.

“Against the whole cultivation world?!” she cried out angrily, eyes blazing with fire. “You, the Great Yiling Laozu against the world! No one can hurt you, right? You’re such a powerful, strong individual!”

Out of anger, she kept insulting him with that cold tone. Getting under others’ skin was after all an easy thing for her to do.

“What is wrong with you?! Why are you acting like that?!” he fumed. Wen Xuan shook her head in disbelief. Was it not easy to guess? Was it not obvious? She couldn’t bear to look at him anymore and fled the scene, leaving Wei Ying to dwell on things on his own.

By the time she emerged from the cave, Wei Wuxian had already left with Wen Ning. Her anger somewhat dimmed but she still couldn’t watch the whole thing playing down. Wen Xuan already witnessed many horrible things and losing a person who was one of the most important to her felt like someone punched a hole through her chest, grabbed her heart and ripped it right out of her body.

It was night time when she reached the next city. The people seemed restless and some cultivators were heading the way she came from. Fortunately, she managed to hide from their eyes and find a spot in an inn. Wen Xuan sat quietly in a dark corner, sipping on her tea when her ears picked up the conversation of a group of men two tables further down from her.

“Why are there so many cultivators running towards Lanling? Did they invite the whole world for another banquet? It wouldn’t be new, they like to flaunt their fortune! Zui!” a burly man said in disgust, clearly not fond of the Jin sect.

“Haven’t you heard?! Man! You’re living a way too secluded life after all!” another slapped his knee. “Let me tell you then, the Yiling Patriarch was invited to the sect heir’s son’s birthday celebration but the foul man that Yiling Patriarch is, he killed Jin ZiXuan! They got into a fight over something but the sect heir died and now everyone wants to hunt down Wei Wuxian!”

Wen Xuan accidentally let go of her cup, drawing attention to herself with the sharp clinking of the porcelain. She quickly fumbled with her tea, wiping up the spilled liquid avoiding the stares. Fortunately, people turned their attention away and continued their conversations. With trembling hands, she placed back everything and paid quickly. She needed to get to him. She needed to save him.

When Wen Xuan reached Lanling it was already on fire, the sounds of swords clashing filled the night. She made her way inside to see cultivators going at each others’ throats while they tried to get rid of the animated corpses roaming around and attacking them. It was all a blur as she looked around. Wen Xuan couldn’t make out which limb belonged to which person.

She quickly spotted her friend. Wei Wuxian was glowing with anger as he played Chenqing, the melodies filling her ears. Suddenly, a different melody hit her ears, her eyes skimming over the crowd but she couldn’t tell where the different notes came from. Furrowing her eyebrows she jumped into action, her voice following the melody Wei Wuxian was playing, strengthening his control over the corpses. But it wasn’t enough.

Things escalated so fast that she barely had time to process what was happening. Jiang Yanli’s desperate voice came from her side. Walking over, Wen Xuan made sure that no one could get close to the other woman. She knew that Jiang Yanli was important for her friend and so she made sure to keep her out of harm's way. Jiang Cheng made his way to her in time but when he noticed Wen Xuan, he pointed his sword at her throat threateningly. She stared at him coldly but did not make any threatening move.

“Who are you?!”

Jiang Wanyin looked mostly frightened as his eyes looked at her with distrust. She stepped back a little from his sword before she replied.

“Wei Wuxian’s friend. Keep an eye on your sister, she shouldn’t be here.”

“Don’t-”

“Where is A-Xian?”

Jiang Yanli’s voice came from behind Jiang Wanyin, she held onto her brother but her eyes looked at Wen Xuan with hope.

“You should get out of here. It is dangerous for you to be here at the moment.” Wen Xuan shook her head.

Jiang Cheng knew she was right and so he turned to his sister, ushering her back to the Jiang clan’s disciples. Suddenly the corpses started acting wild, attacking her and even if she tried her hardest she couldn’t keep them back. Looking around frightened, she saw Wei Wuxian kneeling on the ground. Her heart thumped hard in her chest as she watched him crying out desperately.

“Wei Ying!”

Wen Xuan’s voice seemed to have reached his ears and soon, he looked up to see her approaching form.

“What are you doing here?! Go away!” he yelled at her but his handsome face was not angry so much as scared. Scared for her life. Wen Xuan smiled at him gently and pulled him to his feet but he quickly shook her hand off of himself and jumped into the air. Her heart pounded heavily in her chest as she watched him.

Wei Wuxian took out the Stygian Tiger Seal and it seemed like time stopped. Everyone’s attention was drawn to his form.

“Since you all want to obtain it so badly, then each of you use your own abilities to snatch it.”

Wei Ying threw the Seal into the crowd, the dark energy quickly surrounding it and breaking it into small pieces.

“Wei Ying!” she cried out but he no longer listened. She felt his tears land on her cheek from above making her heart break at his pain. This shouldn’t have happened if she could be quicker, if she didn’t leave Burial Mounds in her anger. Regret filled her veins as she watched him jump to the side, landing on the edge of the cliff. Her eyes widened in horror and quickly followed him, her mind filled with panic.

“Wei Ying! Come back!” Wen Xuan cried out, standing there with her feet rooted to the ground. It was already too late as Wei Wuxian stepped back and let his body fall. Wen Xuan jumped after him to grab his hand, her body piercing through the air like an arrow.

Her heart filled with hope when she finally felt his slender fingers in her palm and she clutched onto him tightly. She landed on the ground as she held onto his hand, her waist painfully impaled by the stone under her. Wei Wuxian was quite heavy compared to her which made both of them slowly inch downward. She couldn’t keep him up much longer but she knew she had to try. She couldn’t let go.

“Wen Xuan…” he breathed as he looked up at her. “Wen Xuan, let go.”

Suddenly, hands grabbed her waist, pulling her back slightly and another hand grabbed Wei Wuxian over her small hand. She looked over her shoulder to see Lan Wangji, blood dripping down his arm from a cut he received previously. Wen Xuan smiled in gratitude but that soon turned into panic.

Jiang Wanyin walked up behind the two of them, his sword drawn out of its sheath, his features contorted by anger.

“Wei Wuxian!” Jiang Wanyin cried out, his voice filled with hatred, disappointment and anger but mostly.

“No!”

“Go and die!”

The sword embedded into the stone under her and Wei Ying quickly pulled his hand out of her grasp. Wen Xuan’s heart stopped beating for a few minutes as she watched him fall to his death, tears rolling down her eyes.

Thirteen years later ~

Some things never change. Wei Wuxian still disliked the way everything was so restricting in the Gusu Lan clan. Lan Wangji brought him to Gusu after defeating Jin Guangyao and the world seemed to settle into peace.

“Lan Zhan! Wait for me!” Wei Ying hurried after his friend who seemed to be eager to show him something.

Wei Wuxian couldn’t seem to shake the memories of Wen Xuan out of his head. She knew things would turn bad, she tried to warn him but he only driven her away… but then she came back, almost losing her life while trying to protect him. He remembered the desperate cry he heard when he fell off that cliff, his eyes trained on her pained features, her agony showing on her beautiful face.

He knew that she must be somewhere far away or maybe she died and now she got her peace. His heart strangely skipped a beat at the thought of her being dead. After all the time they spent together he grew fond of her. Before meeting her, none of the girls grabbed his attention, he couldn’t really tell why exactly but their meak personalities never appealed to him somehow. Wen Xuan was different, she never backed out of an argument, never feared opposing him.

“Where are we going? Why aren’t you telling me anything?” he kept on nagging Lan Wangji but the tall man refused to say anything. Then his eyes widened when he recognized the place. The cold pond where Lan Zhan healed his wounds after getting punished with Wei Wuxian still looked the same. What shocked him was to see a figure standing by the shore.

“You brought an old friend, I see.”

That voice.

Wei Wuxian’s eyes widened in shock, his feet leading him to the figure wearing all white. The hood covering her head was reaching down to her nose, hiding her gaze as long as it was pulled over her head. Her dark hair was pulled into a long braid that reached her hips. He grabbed her shoulder and turned her around to see her beautiful face, however, now her left cheek had a long scar running from her temple to her chin. However, to Wei Wuxian, Wen Xuan was still as beautiful as before no matter what. Her lips pulled into a gentle smile when she took him in.

“Wei Ying, hao qiu bu jian.”

End ~

#mo dao zu shi #the untamed #cql lwj #cql #cql wwx #romance #angst #fluff #lan wangji #wei wuxian #jiang wanyin #drama #wei wuxian x reader #mdzs x reader #mdzs wei wuxian #mdzs #hanguang jun #wei ying

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robininthelabyrinth · 3 years

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I'm pretty sure this is prompt four. Jiang Cheng/Qin Su - Jin Rusong as heir to Lotus Pier

ao3

Jiang Cheng heard the news in pieces, scraps of wild rumor and gossip repeated a hundred times over, but he still refused to believe it until he actually saw the official announcement.

Jin Guangyao had divorced his wife and sent her back to her father’s house, along with their son.

“Is he insane?” Jiang Cheng asked his second in command, who only shrugged helplessly. “Putting aside the fact that I’m certain that he loves her madly, putting everything else aside, Sect Leader Qin is influential and powerful, and a strong supporter of his father – no matter what happened between them, surely someone as pleasant and compromising as Jin Guangyao could find a way to work it out?”

Jiang Cheng had only met Qin Su a few times, always at Jin Guangyao’s side. He’d heard about how she’d fallen for the dashing young man that turned out to be Jin Guangyao and sworn to marry him, no matter the obstacles; he’d heard how they’d managed to overcome every storm, fight the wind and rain, and eventually made it to their marriage bed.

They’d even had a son together, little Jin Rusong; he was Jin Ling’s best playmate.

And Jin Guangyao was kicking him out? Kicking her out?

Absurd!

Who did he think he was?

And yet, contrary to Jiang Cheng’s expectations, Sect Leader Qin did not immediately explode, or, rather, within a few days, he did, but not in the way anyone had expected. Everyone had joked that he would find Jin Guangyao and strangle him, and he really did physically attack someone – but not Jin Guangyao.

He attacked Jin Guangshan instead.

It was as if he’d gone mad, red-eyed like Nie Mingjue in the throes of his qi deviation; he’d charged at Jin Guangshan, his old friend of thirty years or more, right in the middle of Jinlin Tower, and swiped at him viciously with his sword, cutting a gash in his chest as the surprised Jin sect leader darted back too slowly to wholly dodge.

What could be done? The Lanling Jin sect guards could not stand silently by with such provocation – they counter-attacked at once, and Sect Leader Qin did not survive. A little later, and it was discovered that he had never intended on it: his sword was laced with poison.

Sect Leader Qin died, but he took Jin Guangshan down with him the underworld.

The rumor mill exploded.

Everyone was talking about Sect Leader Qin’s motivations – the suspicious timing of the divorce – Jin Guangyao’s now inevitable ascension to the seat of Sect Leader Jin –

Only Jiang Cheng thought about Qin Su, who should have been ascending right beside him. It had been her father that had died, after all.

Laoling Qin was far enough away from Lanling Jin that they were still mostly independent, and they were close enough to the Qinghe Nie that Jiang Cheng could pretend that he’d only made a short detour on a visit directed towards Nie Huaisang, that notorious purveyor of gossip; luckily enough, Nie Huaisang remembered their old friendship and was more than happy to help cover his tracks.

When Jiang Cheng arrived, the house was already decked out in mourning. Qin Su greeted him, eyes red and swollen from tears.

“I’m sorry,” Jiang Cheng said awkwardly, then flinched when he realized he probably should have said something in greeting first – they really didn’t know each other well enough to skip over all that.

Nevertheless, Qin Su nodded, forgiving him the slip-up before he could even retract it. She was gracious and gentle, kind and quiet, economical and thoughtful – a consummate hostess. The wife of Jin Guangyao could not afford to be anything less.

Former wife.

Jiang Cheng’s gaze danced around the room, searching for something to say, and then abruptly he noticed – “There are two deaths in your household?”

“My mother took her own life,” Qin Su said, her voice dull. She tried to suppress it, but tears gathered in her eyes again. “Shortly before…”

Whatever it was that Jin Guangshan had done that had driven Sect Leader Qin mad, it had involved his wife, Jiang Cheng thought, and then abruptly he turned pale as he put two and two together. He’d never doubted that Jin Guangyao had adored Qin Su, so why would he divorce her?

Unless…

Jin Guangshan had a reputation.

Qin Su laughed a little, a bitter sound. “Everyone will know, soon enough,” she said wisely, seeing that Jiang Cheng had figured it out. “I don’t blame my former husband at all; he acted as he ought to in every respect. It’s only my poor A-Song…I can’t imagine what his life will be like from now on.”

Jiang Cheng looked helplessly at her. To lose not only your parents, one right after the other, but your husband, your reputation, and next even your son…

“Marry me,” he said suddenly, and Qin Su stared at him. “If Sect Leader Jin’s assault were recent rather than ancient, it would have provoked the same result. The only reason anyone might suspect the truth is because of the timing of your divorce – if there’s a reason given for that, people won’t think twice about it.”

His words had come out all in a rush, smashing together like stones tossed around by a waterfall; he hadn’t thought of the idea until right this moment.

“Are you suggesting I admit to adultery?” she asked. Her eyes were as round as the full moon.

Jiang Cheng shrugged, a little helpless. “Your reputation is gone,” he pointed out, wishing he knew how to be kind or tactful. “Adultery or incest – it’s the same either way for you. But for A-Song…”

To be the son of an adulterous woman was disgraceful, but such things happened and people generally looked the other way, as long as the real father was powerful enough.

It was better than being a child of incest.

“But what of your reputation?” she asked. “Sect Leader Jiang, you can’t. I won’t let you injure yourself for my sake.”

“Not for you,” he said, though maybe it was, just a little bit. The loss of your parents, the loss of your whole life, everything you’d ever believed – who could understand that better than him? “For A-Song. He’s Jin Ling’s best friend.”

Qin Su had always been kind to Jin Ling, he thought. She didn’t need to be, could just tolerate him the way most people in Jinlin Tower did, but she really seemed to like him…

It occurred to him suddenly that Qin Su met all of his requirements for a bride: a beauty from a good family, obedient, economical, with a mild personality who wasn’t too loud and wasn’t too talkative, who was good to Jin Ling…

“How’s your cultivation?” he asked abruptly. “Do you know how to cook?”

“Mediocre,” she said, blinking at him. “And I’m better at baking, I think. I like making sweets.”

“Good,” Jiang Cheng said, relieved. “That’s – good. I’m glad. Will you marry me?”

Qin Su bit her lip. “Let me think about it?”

Thoughtful, he added to the list. Cautious, not reckless.

“Take all the time you need,” he said.

She came back to him two shichen later. “What happens to A-Song?” she asked.

“I’ll adopt him as my own,” Jiang Cheng said. “Or he can keep the surname Jin, if you prefer. And if Lianfeng-zun agrees, which I think he will – it’s his birthright, after all.” Too many times over. “Jin Ling lives with me sometimes; they can grow up as cousins, the way they should.”

Qin Su nodded, lips trembling a little. “You won’t regret this?”

“I might,” Jiang Cheng admitted. “But I’m probably not going to marry anyone else, and I’m willing. Are you?”

“I am,” she said, and smiled at him. Her eyes were still red, and the smile shaky, but it was something. “Thank you. I…no, never mind.”

“If we’re going to be married, you’re going to need to learn to ask things of me,” he reminded her.

Qin Su wiped her eyes. “Yes, but there’s asking reasonable things, and then there’s asking to alert my former husband before we announce our engagement.”

“Oh, no, that’s a great idea,” Jiang Cheng said, immediately relieved. “If there’s one thing Lianfeng-zun knows, it’s how to manage an announcement of that sort of magnitude. We should definitely tell him.”

Qin Su’s smile this time was stronger.

Nie Huaisang pulled a few strings and got Jin Guangyao to come over to the Unclean Realm, and when he walked in and saw Qin Su, he flinched. Jiang Cheng could see on his face that he still loved her, and he felt bad for him – not enough to stop, but still.

“I see,” Jin Guangyao said, hearing the plan. His expression was surprisingly neutral – thoughtful, but not as upset as Jiang Cheng would have expected. “It’s not a bad idea. And you don’t even need to admit to adultery, either.”

“We don’t?” Jiang Cheng asked, surprised.

“We can say that my marriage with A-Su broke down after my father’s actions - painting them as recent, rather than ancient,” Jin Guangyao explained. “I didn’t feel I could oppose him, she had no choice but to do so – it was an irrevocable breach. You came to comfort her, having met her during your visits with Jin Ling, and her sect is in need of support…you can say it developed naturally from there. It might not work to quell the rumors, of course, but it would at least provide a way to save face in public…Leave it to me.”

“Thank you, A-Yao,” Qin Su said quietly, and he smiled at her, pained.

“Just be happy,” he said to her, then looked at Jiang Cheng. “Treat her well.”

“I will,” Jiang Cheng promised, and took her by the hand. “I swear.”

It was a few years later. Nie Huaisang sat beside Jiang Cheng.

“I think he killed my brother,” he said, playing with his fan. “I’m going to destroy him.”

Jiang Cheng stared at the newest memorial tablet in the Lotus Pier, his hands clenched into fists with knuckles turned white.

“Good,” he said, voice savage. “I’ll help.”

#mdzs #jiang cheng #qin su #jin guangyao #nie huaisang #my fic #my fics #I'm sorry

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jungwookjins · 3 years

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Hi! I'm introducing some friends to the untamed and making some notes on where the netflix subs don't give enough information/good translations, according to the fandom. I saw your translation of the 'to die by your hand' scene and it KILLED me, so I was wondering if there are any other particular scenes you think it's important to note a different translation? Thank you so much if you can!

ooh so there aren't any scenes i can think of where the translation falls so so short of the actual emotion and meaning as much as that one, however there are definitely some less dramatic instances.

in general, i would say that mandarin (and a lot of other languages from what i've heard) has a lot more inherent emotional depth than english, so in translation, a lot of the subtitles sound very emotionally neutral or ambivalent when they really aren't.

the instance of this that sticks out to me the most is during the confrontation between wei wuxian and jiang cheng at the guanyin temple (ep 48, ~9 minutes in) where wuxian says to jiang cheng「都不要放在心上了」(dou bu yao fang zai xin shang), which the subtitles translate as "please don't keep it in your heart," which i'm actually not really mad at as a translation, but it's just not a phrase used much in english, so it sounds slightly awkward/doesnt convey the emotional context of that phrase.

so for context, mandarin has multiple ways of saying, loosely, "don't worry." there's「不要擔心」(bu yao dan xin), which is probably the most common and versatile to say it, and there's「不要放在心上」(bu yao fang zai xin shang), which is the one wuxian says to jiang cheng. (there's other ways too, they're just not rly relevant here) the literal translation of it is "do not put it on your heart," which the netflix is pretty close to, but ofc that doesn't tell u much abt usage. the way i've explained it in the past was, say u made a mistake at work and were beating urself up over it.「不要擔心」is something your coworker or boss might say to you to essentially say "hey it's no big deal, don't worry about it, ur fine;" it can be very casual. whereas, once you get home and start talking abt ur bad day at work,「不要放在心上」is more likely something your parent/sibling/partner/other loved one would say to you as they put a bowl of ur favorite soup in front of u. it has a level of inherent familiarity and deeper desire to comfort the person ur talking to than「不要擔心」. (note: i say inherent bc「不要擔心」doesnt have to always be casual/relatively emotionally neutral, it can be said w emotion ofc but the words themselves do not carry as much emotion as「不要放在心上」.

other than that, i’m not remembering any other specific scenes rn (if i remember smth, i’ll rb w the addition and @ you), but one thing that happens throughout the show is translation discrepancy when characters are addressing each other. for example, when wuxian and jiang cheng talk to yanli, the subtitles always have them both addressing her by name, but in chinese, family members often dont address each other by name, like my younger brothers both call me 姐 (jie), which means older sister. jiang cheng calls yanli 阿姐 (a-jie) most of the time (the 阿 at the beginning is just a prefix used in front of names and other forms of address to express familiarity, it’s the same character used in a-yuan). wuxian calls yanli 師姐 (shijie), which is what you call a senior female fellow student studying under the same master/in the same school/etc.

(rest under the cut bc this got rly long)

nie huaisang calls mingjue 大哥 (dage)/哥 (ge); 哥 means older brother and 大 means big, so 大哥 is often used for the eldest brother (esp common if there are multiple brothers). an interesting thing is that wangji does not call xichen 哥 or any variation of it, rather he calls him 兄長 (xiong zhang), which also means older brother but is a term of respect and much more formal, so that’s also a reflection of their characters and upbringing. 兄長 is not in common use nowadays but 哥 very much still is.

after nie mingjue, lan xichen, and jin guangyao take their oath of sworn brotherhood, they also change their forms of address with each other. for example, guangyao calls xichen 二哥 (er ge), which means second older brother (since xichen is the second oldest) and calls mingjue 大哥 (like huaisang does). (i feel like i vaguely remember guangyao being called 三弟 (san di), which means third younger brother, by someone but don’t remember if it was xichen or mingjue.)

(also impt to note that in chinese culture, familial terms as forms of address aren’t strictly reserved for family (whether that be blood or found). for example, in a casual setting, you can address any woman who is your parents’ age or between their age and your grandparents age as 阿姨 (a-yi) (or name + 阿姨), which is the term for your maternal aunt, and you can address any man of the same age range as 叔叔 (shu shu), which is what you’d call your paternal uncle. similarly in a familiar/casual setting, you can call women older than you but younger than your parents 姐姐/name + 姐, like the daughters, who are all younger than me, of my parents’ friends call me jessie jie-jie. and you can call men in the same age range 哥哥/name + 哥, like how wang yibo calls xiao zhan, zhan-ge. the same applies for people younger than you, with which you would use 妹妹, younger sister, and 弟弟, younger brother.)

another example is that jin guangshan calls jiang fengmian 江兄 (jiang xiong), 江being his family name ofc and 兄 meaning brother (same character as in 兄長, which wangji calls xichen), since they’re of the same age and status and their wives are sworn sisters. xichen, on the other hand, calls fengmian 江宗主 (jiang zong zhu), which means sect leader jiang. in the subtitles, these are often just translated as “you,” when they’re talking directly to him.

so in general, there is a lot of information abt characters’ relationships, level of familiarity with each other, age, etc that is contained in their forms of address that just doesn’t come across in the netflix subs, since those default to their names like 80% of the time.

hope this helps!! if u (or anyone else) have other questions/scenes ur wondering abt, feel free to ask, i’m always down to talk translations. and if you want to see more of my beef w netflix subs a;lskjdf, all of my cql gifsets with dialogue on them have either been translated from scratch by me or i’ve edited the netflix translations, and i usually put some notes abt my translation in the tags. any sets that i’ve translated from scratch are under my translations tag, though most of these are actually for word of honor/shan he ling and not cql.

edit: check my reblog in the notes for some more additions!!

#sorry this got so long ;lakjsdf but this was legit rly fun to answer #ive been meaning to make a gifset w my translation for the guanyin temple scene for so long but havent gotten around to it #mayhaps i will this weekend #(also as a disclaimer: like with any part of a language the forms of address used can differ regionally #for example ik some chinese people use 姨媽 (yi ma) instead of 阿姨 for their maternal aunts #my family is taiwanese-chinese and i was born and raised in the us so that's the background/region my knowledge is coming from)#u kno what i'll put this in some main tags too bc i feel like this is good to know #the untamed #mo dao zu shi #mdzs #answered #nbvagabond #mine #okay to rb #my translation #<--i dont have a better tag for this rn so

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veliseraptor · 5 months

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potential (and very self indulgent) au: jiang yanli and jiang cheng join wei wuxian in becoming demonic cultivators

oooh, fun. I have kind of a hard time making this one work in my head (especially for jiang cheng, actually), but let's see here, I've been Challenged so I'm going to make it work

first off, Jiang Cheng - I think the initial requirement here is that the Jiang Sect is never reconstructed. whether that's because it's just too wrecked to rebuild or for whatever reason Jiang Cheng can't hold it (the sect) together (unfair to Jiang Cheng imo, but handwave), but if Jiang Cheng has a sect to protect that he will never see decimated like it was before again, I don't think he would ever turn to demonic cultivation and the risks it entails (politically, socially, etc.). even though in the immediate aftermath of Sunshot Wei Wuxian's skills aren't considered with quite the same hostility they are later, they still are pretty quickly increasingly suspect by society at large.

the other possibility here would be the core transplant not working out, somehow - either temporarily succeeding and then there's some kind of rejection, or it just never succeeds and both Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian end up coreless. Jiang Cheng seizes on the one means he now has to get revenge for the death of his family, and maybe believing that he couldn't lead a sect without his cultivation (I don't think it would necessarily be impossible, but he didn't ask me) he doesn't try to rebuild Jiang Sect at all.

the hard one here I think is Jiang Yanli, who doesn't seem to have significant cultivation ambitions in general, and certainly her brothers would both heavily push back against her practicing something as dangerous as demonic cultivation, particularly considering she seems to have a delicate constitution.

(I'm personally partial when it comes to demonic cultivator Jiang Yanli to it happening after Wei Wuxian's death, with also a dead Jiang Cheng and Jin Zixuan, driven by a need to protect and fear for Jin Ling, but that doesn't suit this particular AU. in this maybe she's just driven/motivated by the need to protect her brothers, who are both walking a dangerous path now.

this would have the side effect of probably nixing her marriage to Jin Zixuan entirely, since she's not going to be looking terribly eligible under the circumstances - and wouldn't be bringing a sect alliance with her. Jin Guangshan isn't going to go for that one, love match or not.

all three of them in this scenario no longer have the protection of a sect behind them, though, which puts them in an even more precarious position - pressure to join one, certainly, but also putting them on the fringes of things, which is not a good place to be in the cultivation world.

the trouble here is going to still come with the Wen remnants, though - Wei Wuxian still feels obligated to protect them, and Jiang Cheng perhaps even more emphatically in this AU (particularly if he's coreless) does not. without the need to protect the sect Jiang Cheng might land in a different place than he does in canon, but it definitely would put a strain on their relationship, and the last thing that they need at that point would be to be divided as society gets increasingly hostile.

I have a hard time envisioning this AU going anywhere good, tbh; I feel like it ends in a blaze of glory with all three siblings dead in a siege on the Burial Mounds. but maybe that's my pessimism talking. maybe their powers combined could hold off the force of the cultivation world's hostility pressing down on them. but it doesn't look great for our heroes.

#conversating #sandushengshou #i WANT it to work out for them but i have a hard time seeing it #if jc has jiang sect to look after i don't think he turns to demonic cultivation #if he turns to demonic cultivation then he and jyl don't have the protection of sect belonging #augh. this one was hard!#five headcanons meme #the sad queer cultivators show #jiang cheng #jiang yanli #wei wuxian

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hamliet · 2 years

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(Y)uwu: Remnants of Filth

Or, the novel I told myself I'd read the first 20 chapters of one night and then read the first 75 and then it was the wee hours of the morning. Oops.

It might be my favorite Meatbun novel thus far, though CFC is not finished yet, so we shall see. The angst was just perfectly my taste (chapter 56 killed me), so I was drawn in from the beginning, even if I was pretty consistently like this throughout reading:

Gu Mang and Mo Xi are like an AU of Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji (with a little Jin Guangyao mixed into Gu Mang, imo). Bratty demonic-cultivation-associated boy and righteous boy who turns out to be horny for bratty boy whom the world hates. There are even Jin Guangshan, Jin Ling, and Jiang Cheng-esque characters. But, it’s not the same story, though there might be some inspiration. Each character feels completely their own, with realistic strengths and flaws and compelling goals driving them forwards through a terribly cruel world. No one established complex character was fully evil.

The main two, Gu Mang and Mo Xi, were both instantly likable, pitiable, and easy to root for. The characters I hated at first (like Murong Lian) got fully explored to the point where it was impossible not to see them as human. And even though some twists with certain characters were obvious (Mengzhe not being a healer, for one; Meatbun really doesn’t trust healers does she?) the ultimate reveals were still satisfying. Mengzhe, again, in particular felt like it worked because it was an anticlimax... she wasn’t a Shi Mei-esque final villain, and there was still much good in her, but she was also not the saint she feigned being. But, that saintly part of her was still enough for her to not only achieve her goal (ruling), but to be encouraged to do better.

The major twist was of course the fact that Gu Mang was no traitor at all. Not only did I feel this twist was earned, but ultimately necessary (the best kind of twist): it resonated with the themes, reinforcing them by offering us a new perspective. I'm actually not sure it would have worked for the story to keep him as guilty, if only because him being innocent actually offered far more of a challenge for Mo Xi than for him to be guilty. Gu Mang’s innocence made Mo Xi question exactly what/who his loyalty was to, and what really counted as betrayal. It made him realize he was a betrayer in many senses, and that was fascinating to me (yes, Gu Mang was my boy, but I loved Mo Xi too!).

As for other side characters... Yue Chenqing was a precious baby, and Murong Chuyi and Jiang Yexue were definitely a side ship. As I read, I found myself comparing them to Mei Hanxue and Xue Meng from 2ha, so I thought, it’ll stay subtext. And then. It didn’t. And then. Surprise, they’re brothers but no one knew. And then. Surprise, one’s controlling the other. And then, surprise, they die together. But their deaths were so, so beautiful that I found myself actually crying as I read.

While Jiang Yexue may have died a villain who needed to be stopped, he died knowing that he was loved, even for one moment, by the person he most wanted to love him in Murong Chuyi. In fact, Murong Chuyi’s sacrificial death to stop Jiang Yexue was an act of love, because he knew Jiang Yexue would be horrified if free from the demonic influence, because he knew Jiang Yexue was better than this. In stopping him, Murong Chuyi showed him that he too remembered the boy he spoke to in the snow that day. Their love story was clearly a tragic reflection of Gu Mang and Mo Xi’s, and so well integrated into the overall plot. Genuinely one of the most beautiful scenes I’ve read in fiction.

Speaking of the boys who turned out to be brothers, the story offers interesting commentary on birth status and class, and even gender at times. Murong Lian and Gu Mang are brothers, yet one is a slave and one is not. Jiang Yexue and Yue Chenqing are brothers, but Jiang Yexue is scorned for being a bastard--yet he is still treated better than Gu Mang, because he wasn’t born a slave. And then you have Murong Chuyi, who is adopted into the family, but because of his blood is never fully accepted as a member of the family--and then it turns out he is a member of the family, conceived from his father’s r*pe of a poor girl, but no one even knew.

Yet, class and blood are often performances more than anything else, as is loyalty towards a country. Lu Zhanjing might’ve been the one literally under control of the Zhenlong Chess Formation, but was not literally every character a part of a chess game? Even the ones who assumed they were chess masters ended up becoming pawns to another chess master.

There was no end to a tangled web of players, and if you play the game of war and politics, you more often than not lose your freedom. You become a slave to a game master, and you don’t even know who it is you’re really serving. That’s fascinating political commentary.

Of course, like Meatbun's other two novels, Yuwu makes copious use of alchemy:

the first chemical wedding/sex scene post-reuniting is literally taking place because of primal instincts on a demonic bat island, and I lost count of how often the term “primitive” was used.

Murong Lian is the body character to accompany the mind/soul and heart/spirit ones in Gu Mang and Mo Xi respectively;

Gu Mang is also associated with white, silver, water, and his mind is carved out;

Mo Xi is associated with red, gold, fire, and Gu Mang stabs his heart.

Meatbun seems to have an affinity for animal alchemical symbolism and within that an affinity for birds. There are so. many. phoenix references; Yue Chenqing is called the Little White Bird, etc.

Of course, the reversal stone is literally the philosopher’s stone.

I’ve spoken before about how I love seeing how a writer evolves through multiple works: you often see repeated elements or tropes that become increasingly refined, and you learn at least a little bit about what questions they ponder and what aspects of humanity they find fascinating. So I loved reading Yuwu after 2ha, and I’m even more excited to see where Meatbun goes with Case File Compendium now. 2ha’s sometimes clumsy thematic balance between the pure idealism of the love between the main couple she portrays and the bitter realism of the world was much better struck in Yuwu (which isn’t necessarily to say that I think Yuwu is technically better: 2ha was also a more ambitious novel in a lot of ways, and I’m still amazed that was her first!). While the flower twist bothered me in 2ha, the twists in Yuwu were fully earned, so I’m hopeful that the same will be the case for Case File Compendium.

I talked about this briefly once before, but there's an element to Meatbun's writing that is... well, I know she herself called it melodrama, but I'm actually not sure that's exactly what I'd call it. Melodrama implies something unearned. I'd call it more 'heightened reality,' like what Dostoyevsky used in his works, wherein the stories--be they set in fantasy settings or a mirror of the real world like CFC--have exaggerated stakes and exaggerated character emotions to meet those stakes. However, the point of these exaggerated emotions isn't to wring out cheap tears from a reader, but instead used as a way to comment on the human being as a creature.

There's an element of the... again, for lack of a better term, I'll resort to 'Freudian id' (which again is better applied to patterns in stories than real life) to her writing. She's not afraid of writing about the very limits and depths a human heart can sink to, the edges of what a human mind and body can endure. It's certainly not to everyone's taste (trigger warnings are good), but there's something that resonates within me there, something real and honest, in a way that many novels peddling realism nowadays but doing so under a shiny gloss that makes them marketable (in the western market specifically) just don't hit. The rank ugliness makes the beauty shine brighter.

There's also an element I've noticed in her novels: it always comes back to the main couple in her stories. Every plot twist, character motion, is connected to their destiny as lovers, and while that's genuinely a technical positive (tight and neat writing), sometimes it can almost feel a little too much? I just am kind of like... let Princess Mengzhe have both sacrificed herself to heal Mo Xi and be poisoning Gu Mang, rather than Gu Mang have healed Mo Xi. (But, for this reason, I loved the inclusion of Lu Zhanjing’s character. He was loving and loved Gu Mang, and Gu Mang loved him (like a brother), and he was good.) Thematically, though, I get that every moment coming back to them ties into the idea of destiny, which is a Thing in her novels. This is an opinion and not a quality thing, to be clear: I am in general less prone to like the concept of fate/destined lovers than I am to like the existentialism of, say, MXTX’s novels. But if you do prefer destined lovers, it’s hard to do it better than Meatbun does.

So anyways, yeah, highly recommend.

#hamliet reviews #yu wu #meatbun doesn't eat meat #gu mang #mo xi #ximang #murong lian #murong chuyi #jiang yexue #xueyi #lu zhanjing #princess mengzhe #remnants of filth #stains of filth

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spockandawe · 3 years

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I was thinking about this post, as I frequently do, and got distracted thinking about the differences between Jiang Cheng and Jin Guangyao’s approaches to parenting Jin Ling. Because I do think they both do love him very deeply, even if one of them dropped the ball very badly in the end, and the more I turned it over in my head, the more it feels like they’re trying to work through their own damage and correct for the mistakes of the previous generation (something that I do think is a deliberate running theme in the story, especially when it comes to parental relationships)

Jin Guangyao had a mother who loved him, right from the start. Even before he realized that Jin Guangshan was never going to be a good father, he never had any reason to doubt the way his mother loved him. What he did struggle with was more... security, in a practical/financial sense. His mother supported them, but the first time he got knocked down a flight of stairs, it was because a john tried to ditch her without paying, which suggests that the loss of a paying customer was a big deal for them. I don’t think she failed him, and I think she genuinely did as well by him as she could, but I also don’t think his childhood was very secure. And after her death, when Jin Guangshan turns him away from Jinlintai, he’s at loose ends, and suffers from his father’s deliberate neglect. He has to take a low-ranking position with the Nie forces, because he doesn’t have many options, and he suffers from that insecurity in other ways too, like having weak cultivation because he wasn’t given an opportunity to learn early enough.

Jiang Cheng, on the other hand, was raised wealthy from the start, and never lacked for money. But his mother was relentlessly critical of him and his siblings, his father blatantly favored his adopted brother (and Wei Wuxian’s entrance into the house was linked with his father ordering him to give up his dogs, who were basically his only friends, for Wei Wuxian’s sake), and there are persistent rumors, which his parents do not do a good job of debunking, that his father would have totally preferring hooking up with Cangse Sanren instead of the mother he actually has. Right in front of him, his mom chews out his dad for not loving his kids enough, just because she gave birth to them.

So Jiang Cheng is bitter, angry, and threatening, but he also makes sure that Jin Ling knows his love is unconditional, no matter what. He gets upset at Jin Ling for not coming to him for help when he needs help, even when he’s also upset at Jin Ling for being stupid and reckless. He’s also apparently made good on these sentiments in very material ways, because when Wei Wuxian asks Jin Ling about all the threats of grievous bodily harm, Jin Ling is like ‘pfffffft, as if he would ever HIT me’. Jin Guangyao is manipulative and controlling, and by the end of the novel, he’s compartmentalized his emotions enough that he’s willing and able to threaten and hurt Jin Ling, if that’s what it takes. But Jin Ling is supported in every material way that Jin Guangyao never had, in ways that don’t require Jin Guangyao to expose his emotions as openly as Jiang Cheng does. When seven-year-old Jin Ling gets into a fight with the other children and trashes his room, Jin Guangyao doesn’t tell him to come to him for help, and he doesn’t demand to know who upset him, he comes to Jin Ling with a spiritual puppy instead, and gives her to Jin Ling as a gift.

Neither of them does a perfect job of parenting, and given their backgrounds and baggage, I also wouldn’t really expect them to do a perfect job. And by their natures, it’s a lot easier to break down Jiang Cheng’s internal processes than Jin Guangyao’s :P But the more I think about this, the more I’m convinced not only that they both spent thirteen/sixteen years doing the best job they could. And not only that, I’m also more and more convinced that they were both working as hard as they could to not fail Jin Ling in the way they felt their parents failed them.

#the untamed #jin guangyao #jiang cheng #jin ling #meta

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myhamartiaishubris · 2 years

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What If... Jiang Cheng Refused the Golden Core

I suddenly had a thought, which was, What if the Jiang brothers actually communicated and Wei Wuxian told Jiang Cheng he would give him his golden core?

Wei Wuxian says, "Do you want my golden core?" Jiang Cheng looks like he's just been slapped.

Wei Wuxian asks again, "Do you want your golden core back? I'll give you mine."

"No," says Jiang Cheng immediately, because he could never do that. "I won't take it from you."

Wei Wuxian shakes his head. "Do you want a golden core again? That's all I'm asking you. If you say yes, I'll give it to you."

Jiang Cheng pauses. And really thinks about it. The chasm in his chest yawns wide, hungry and cold. He wouldn't really be taking it, he thinks. Wei Wuxian himself said it. All he needs to do is tell the truth--yes, he wants his core back. He wants a core back. And Wei Wuxian would-- Wei Wuxian would--

Oh. Wei Wuxian would do anything for him. And for the first time in nearly twenty years Jiang Cheng looks at Wei Wuxian, really looks at him, and what he sees nearly breaks him (for the second time that day).

Because Wei Wuxian--heroic, always-first-place, always-better, Wei Wuxian--thinks all he is good for is offering bits of himself to Jiang Cheng.

And then he remembers his mother's last words. "Protect him with your life."

You idiot, he thinks. She didn't mean it literally. Except, didn't she? He is too much his mother's son to know her truly, and she was always too much lightning to be seen clearly.

What must it do to a person, Jiang Cheng thinks, to be raised by a woman who tells you that your life belongs to your little brother and by a man who praises you for all the violence you can deal and take.

And Wei Wuxian is still waiting for an answer.

Jiang Cheng tells his big brother the most enormous lie he has ever told. "No."

"No? Are you sure? I can--"

"No." The words tear out of him like he's pulling his own guts out. "I can be an ordinary person. Besides, I have you. We're still the Twin Heroes of Yunmeng."

And so Sect Leader Jiang never draws his sword. Some say it's because he has Wei Wuxian by his side, quicker than any blade and wilder than any fire. Some say it's because he's sworn revenge, that once his sword sees the light it must taste blood. Some say it's because he's tired of fighting, tired of war and violence, and has vowed to rebuild Yunmeng Jiang on a foundation of peace. ("Attempt the impossible," after all.)

He wears Zidian on his finger, more of a memento than anything at this point. Obviously he never uses it, but people see it as an object of intimidation and it works out well enough for him. (He once offered it to Wei Wuxian, who did a strange flinch-blank-stiffen-smile thing, in quick succession. He didn't offer again.)

When Wen Qing stumbles onto Lotus Pier in the dead of night, paper-thin and trembling, Wei Wuxian does not hesitate. Jiang Cheng takes a bit of convincing (Wen Qing is a friend, and the story she tells makes him seethe, but he still has a newborn sect to take care of), but then Jin Guangshan has the audacity to bring out prisoners for target practice-- It doesn't take much convincing after that.

So the Wen re-establish themselves near Yunmeng--Chengguan Wen, a small medical sect--and no one touches them. (No one dares, for fear that Sect Leader Jiang's blade might finally flash silver.) Wen Ning is weak and bleeding out, but the Wen are able to bring him back with the help of Yunmeng and Chengguan's resources.

Jin Ling grows up loved and parented, Jin Guangshan dies of something (Jin Guangyao, finally granted the name Ziyao by his brother-turned-sect leader, reports old age and everyone shrugs), and all is well.

#it's been a while since i consumed mdzs/cql content so the characterization might be off?#but honestly i don't really care #everyone in the untamed deserves good things (not jin guangshan)#the untamed #chen qing ling #mdzs #mo dao zu shi #jiang cheng #wei wuxian #fix-it #if someone wants to write this i would not be disinclined to read it

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skyflyinginaction · 3 years

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MDSZ Name Meaning Explanations

Wow MDSZ has intricate naming: there are a lot of interesting meanings that fit very well with the characters!

One thing I realized when I researched names is that Chinese names, like Japanese names, are filled with a lot of nuances that have to do with the characters themselves and their role in the story. The character’s names subtly explain their roles and personality in the story.

These are the characters I noticed are the ones that don’t have a lot of posts about their names. I decided I am going to do a post on the characters whose name meanings are not much talked about in the fandom.

This post is heavily inspired by thisworldgodonlyknows who made a post explaining the meaning of the names from one of MXTX works and what it has to do with corresponding with the characters.

MXTX’s names for her characters in her works seem to be chosen intuitively. This makes sense because the names she chooses have a lot to do with both the characters and their arc in the story.

I won’t be doing any explanations on Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji, Jiang Cheng, and Jiang Yanli

because they already had more than enough metas on them. I’m not a Chinese speaker, so although I will explain my research to the best of my ability in this post, take it with a grain of salt.

Mo Xuanyu (莫玄羽)

Mo Xuanyu’s entire name is a subtle reference to his background in the story.

His surname Mò/莫 means "do not, is not, can not" or "there is none who -“

The character in his surname is used to refer to saying something that is puzzling, baffling or impossible to explain in the Chinese language.

This would make sense when talking about Mo Xuanyu since all we know about him is that he's one of Jin Guangshan’s many illegitimate children. Once a disciple of the Jin Clan until his expulsion due to his homosexuality and harassment of the Jin sect leader Jin Guangyao, his expulsion resulted in more abuse at the hands of his family. The abuse he suffered caused his mind to mentally deteriorate, producing a vengeful side of his personality which led him to take up demonic cultivation leading him to perform the body offering ritual to bring Wei Wuxian back to get revenge on his family for the abuse he suffered from.

We don’t know an awful lot about him or his personality other than his background so this makes him come off as very mysterious.

The character in his given name is Xuán/玄 means "black/mysterious”

The character Xuán/玄 is another character to refer to the color black in a specific context in Chinese but when this character is used it also has negative connotations. The symbolism that black is associated within Chinese culture is destruction, evil, disasters, sadness, and suffering; it is considered an unfortunate color. The symbolism for the color black goes very well with Xuanyu as a Character in his role. The bad fortune aspect could reference how he was expelled from the Jin sect, his suffering under the abuse of the Mo family, and wishing for revenge on them for the abuse he suffered under wishing destruction on them. Black the color of evil this can refer to his interest in demonic cultivation and his connection to Wei Wuxian who practiced demonic cultivation donned black clothes and was called evil by the cultivation world.

Black is another way to refer to yin because yin has the color black. Wei Wuxian’s birth name Wei Ying comes from yin as in yin and yang the character Ying (嬰) from Wei Wuxian birth name comes from Ying ling or infant spirit in Chinese used to refer to the spirits of dead fetuses Which is a possible nod to his demonic cultivation. Ying means infant it can also come from yin as in ghost, death, and evil a subtle reference to he brings Wei Wuxian back through the body offering ritual.

The second character in his given name yǔ/羽 means “feather" (羽) is the character is used for “immortal" or "ascending" this can be considered to be an irony to him similar to how someone who didn’t ascend in cultivation is equivalent to someone who cannot fly. Mo Xuanyu is someone who didn’t ascend in cultivation hence his weak cultivation. (羽) when the language is used in a negative connection meaning “ascend" or "passed away” in Chinese this is given insight into how he died mysteriously with the body offering ritual. His entire given name can refer to how he vanished without a trace, mysteriously and without a sound, like a feather.

Qin Su (秦愫)

Her surname doesn’t mean anything in Chinese; it is just a surname Her given name Sù/愫 means “guileless and sincere” in Chinese this can refer to what was described in the novel as appearance and personality-wise someone innocent and naive.

If you look closely her entire name is a homophone to Qingsu (情愫 qíng sù sentiment feeling) a phrase that is used to describe feelings in Chinese.

Qin Su is an emotional character, guided by her own emotions. This makes her different from other characters who are corrupt and squash their sentimentality for ambition or revenge since the emotional aspect makes her name sound like a sentiment feeling.

Qin Su is guided by her emotions which give her strength An example of this is noted in her backstory. Is when JGY saved her during the sunshot campaign gave her the will to pursue him. The most prominent scene of an emotional outburst where she openly lambasts her husband/brother for his deception and murder of her son her feelings of rage and betrayal gave her the strength to actively resist JGY as he attempts to coax her into giving out the name of who gave her the letter.

An innocent emotional character compared to the corrupt cultivators who died horribly who was too innocent to survive in the corrupt world of cultivators and could not handle knowing the dark truths.

Yu Ziyuan (虞紫鸢)

The character in her surname Yú/虞 means "be anxious or worry." If you dive deeper into her character it speaks to one of her major concerns to how her husband perceives herself and their son in comparison to Wei Ying. Her surname references her major insecurities.

Zǐ/紫 means “purple" her signature color and yuān/鸢 means "kite (bird)” the kite is a type of bird of prey this speaks to her aggressive and fierce personality and strong cultivation.

Zǐyuān (紫鸢) is also another way to refer to the Chinese wall iris; purple is the color of the iris, so this again references to her signature color. Iris has noble connotations that speak to her noble status and a fact that she is a graceful and elegant woman even with her bad temper. Purple flowers are tied to royalty represent dignity and pride both speak to her tremendous pride and noble status.

Luo Qingyang (罗青羊)

Next is Mian Mian

Luō/罗 means “silk” in Chinese; this can invoke the trope "silk hiding under steel.” Underneath her delicate appearance is a tough backbone; she is not afraid to stand up to her own beliefs and the people she cares for.

The character in her given name Qīng/青 means “green" but when used in classical Chinese Qīng is another way to refer to “black”.

yáng/羊 means “sheep.” Sheep are considered innocent in Chinese; the sheep symbolism could emphasize her initial appearance as a frail damsel in distress who needs to be saved. A woman who is considered weak and dumb as a sheep by the sexist men of society.

Also, in ancient Chinese symbolism, sheep represent justice, which goes hand in hand with her tough backbone who is not afraid to stand up to her own beliefs for what’s right and wrong.

So, her given name together means “black sheep.” She would be considered the black sheep in the world of cultivator being born a servant and a woman and easily dismissed.

The black sheep part can refer to how someone who chooses to outcast herself from mainstream cultivation society in favor of pouring her own life as a rough cultivator on its outskirts with her family.

Her nickname MianMian comes from Chinese sheep wool which is called mian yang (绵羊).

Jin Rusong (金如松)

The character of his first name Rú/如 has the same character and meaning as Jin Ling birth name Rúlán/如兰

This refers to how he is the same generation as Jin Ling.

The second character sōng/松 means "pine tree.”

If you put the characters of his given name together means "to be like a pine tree” this Sounds like the phrase "to make like a tree and leave” This can note his one-time appearance in the story. Pine trees symbolize longevity and long life; this is ironic for him because his fate of dying young.

Jinzhu and Yinzhu (金珠 &. 银珠)

Another two minorish characters are Jīnzhū/金珠 and Yínzhū/银珠 their names mean “silver pearl and gold pearl” this doesn't mean much on the surface since the meaning of their names is obvious.

In Chinese pearls, gold and silver are connected to wealth, money, and status. They are meant to say something about Madam Yu’s status as a noble and to emphasize their relationship between master and servant.Gold and silver are valuable and prized this empathizes them being Madam Yu’s prized servants, but this can also indicate something about them as people: they are both known for being extremely skilled cultivators. Their fancy names highlight how prized they are personally to Madam Yu as her right/left-hand women.

Jin Zixuan (金子轩)

Zi/子 means (child), Zi/子 is a generational character that is used in the Jin clan by Guangshan to name his children this can Zixuan is the only legitimate child of the sect leader of his father.

The second character xuān/轩 means "a tall pavilion.” The character xuān/轩 is used to mean “dignified as a king.” His entire name can refer to his position as the inheritor of the Jin clan with all their wealth and estate prestige as well as his lofty attitude.

Jin Ling (金凌)

There was already a meta on Jin Ling birth name Jin Rulan,

His courtesy name Líng/凌 means "rise above.” The e name it goes with the statement "I’ll rise above others;” he wants people to think differently about him due to their prejudice for having no parents and rise above the people’s perceptions of him.

This can mean his character development that he’ll rise above the adults of society and escape the prejudice they eat up through his growing acceptance of Wei Wuxian and maturity at the end when he takes over as a sect leader.

Wen Ning (温宁)

Wen Ning’s given name Níng/宁 means “peace"

His name notes his kind nature in contrast to his cruel, power-hungry relatives and his peaceful nature even when turned into fierce corpses.

His courtesy name Qiónglín/琼林 means “beautiful forest;” this notes his timid personality who hides behind others who is seen hiding behind his sister when first introduced and his low confidence in himself. Forests are used to hide outlaws. This can refer to how he had to hide from society since it deemed him dangerous since he was restructured by Wei Wuxian.

Wen Qing (温情)

Wen Qing’s entire name (Wēn Qíng,温情) when put together means “tenderness” it shares the same character(情) as Qin Su’s name.

She does have a kind-sounding name. At first glance she seems harsh and aggressive but she’s shown to be very kind as shown by her willingness to continuously save WWX and her care for her relatives especially Wen Yuan, and her tenderness and love feelings for her younger brother.

She is also the one who tells WWX “thank you” and “I’m sorry” important arc words that exemplify humility and empathy which WWX then passes onto Jin Ling.

Lan Qiren (蓝启仁)

I found Lan Qiren’s name ironic because the character in his name rén /仁 means “benevolence,” the same one used for kindness and humanity.

I find this ironic in the way he treats his nephews prizing them on the surface as gentlemen but not as individual people.

I find the Qǐ/启 “open" part ironic as well because he doesn’t hold an open mind with Wei Wuxian’s antics considering him a “corrupting influence” on his nephew and disapproved of his use of demonic cultivation. Reluctance to accept him and Lan Wangji’s marriage, scolding Lan Xichen for showing grief over his best friend’s death despite his feelings and life in danger. On the surface, it doesn’t seem like he actually holds any kindness but when examined the character rén /仁 it fits his personality well.

The character rén /仁 came from Confucianism. Ren is the fundamental virtue in Confucian that represents the moral qualities that govern man and his relationship with others. It’s considered the perfect virtue or can be categorized as the ren of virtue and ren of affection. Ren of affection is considered compassion and empathy for others as well as altruism for another human being. Ren of virtue symbolizes the perfect virtue of moral perfection and human excellence, to become a morally perfect individual to nurture morally upright individuals that are grounded in moral values.

When I looked deeper into rén /仁 it says a lot about him as a character which is that he cares about the rules of the Lan sect and gets angry at any perceived misconduct. Though he lacks the kindness and humility of ren he has the rules of ren Qiren have more of the ren or virtue is seen how he treats his nephews characterized them as perfect moral gentlemen first than people the second build on his high standards to his nephews, to be honest, righteous and immaculate raise them to be model students.

This can reference his status as a teacher in how he teaches both his nephew and students to be upright and moral citizens of society. the meaning in his given name "Open benevolence” can be on how he preaches the rules to others in short openly preaches the ren in Confucianism the character rén /仁 suits someone who cares about the rules not the compassion of ren.

Lan Jingyi (蓝景仪)

Jǐng/景 means “scenery"

Jingyi’s second character yí/仪 contains the meaning "courtesy, etiquette, manners" and comes from Yi which is something that is used in etiquette and ceremonial.

His name can be a reference to him being in the Lan sect and his and Qiren’s names are made to represent the Lan sect principles.

When you look at Lan Jingyi he doesn’t seem to fit the traditional standards of a Lan sect disciple with being both brash and outspoken, but he is the Laniest of the Lan sect disciples there is. He does care about the Lan sect rules and gets angry at anyone who breaks them this is shown with the way he gets annoyed at Wei Wuxian in Cloud Recess for breaking the rules and how he embodies the Lan sect motto is when he speaks up for Wei Wuxian against the cultivators during the second segue of the burial mounds. He shows to be different in the way he follows the rules and discipline, not in a quiet, stiff way but a very loud outspoken way.

Jin Guangyao (金光瑶)

His name is a cruel irony to his character and symbolic of his relationship with him and his father.

His birth name is Meng Yao. Meng/孟 means " eldest amongst brothers” this can mean being the only son of his mother. Yáo/瑶 means "jade, precious stone” this can infer how he is beloved by his mother.

But his name Yáo can likely be a reference to the pearl button Jin Guangshan gave Meng Shi. The pearl button is symbolic of his relationship to Meng Shi and Guangyao.

Another is seen in his courtesy name Guangyao is that he lacked the generational name Zi like the rest of his father’s children. There’s a reason for that.Him not sharing the generational character means that Jin Guangyao is acknowledged as part of the family but not as a son. This showed that Guangshan accepted him due to his accomplishment only to further his ambitions for the Jin clan and insulted him by saying he was not in the same status as his sons denying him from an equal standing among them. He was never acknowledged as having equal standing with them because of his status as the prostitute’s son.

His courtesy name Guang/光 carries the same characters in Guangshan’s name this can apply his desperation to get his fathers love and approval to how he does anything to gain it.

Only to realize that he never thought much of him and was like the prostitutes in the brothel he uses then discards when he’s done with them just like how his father did with his mother. he doesn’t actually think much of Guangyao and Meng Shi only being valued Meng Shi for giving him personal amusement and pleasure but not value as a person and GuangYao for his accomplishments for his political goals, not the person himself he’s someone of little value to his father as the pearl button had.

Nie Mingjue (聂明玦)

Second, of the Venerated Triad Nie Mingjue. If you split the name character apart Míng/明 means “clear, bright” and jué玦 means "a penannular jade.” His name is read as "bright penannular jade"

Jué玦 comes from Yujue/ 玉玦 which is a jade pendant that is often used as a symbol of separation or resolution for homophony reasons reference as someone who has their mind made up and won’t change it; this notes his relationship with Guangyao and NMJ’s personality. The separation and resolution note his tragic broken bond with Jin Guang Yao whose rigid view of morality and sense of justice and Guangyao’s desperation for approval worsened their relationship over time.

His name goes well with his rigid views of justice and black and white mortality he displays. He is someone who never listens to the views and opinions of others and never empathizes with them; he is someone who is deadset and rigid in their views who won’t listen to someone’s opinions regarding his own rigid black and white morality and harsh pursuit of justice.

Lan Xichen(蓝曦臣)

Lan Xichen name xīchén/曦臣 means “Chancellor of the morning sun”, the chen/臣 part of his given name notes his warm, friendly temperament in contrast to his younger brothers frosty cold exterior the morning sun next to his brother’s stoic face. Chancellor refers to his high position in the cultivation society of the venerate triad members of the Lan clan.

His birth name huàn/ 涣 means to “dissolve” which could mean the dissolution of his innocence as he grows more aware of the corruption that lies around him even those he trusts the most at the end of the story he’s left in turmoil he has to deal with the fact that he factored into the deaths of his two friends. His doubts towards Nie Hanshang could imply that he would go back to the optimistic naive man he once was.

Nie Huaisang (聂怀桑)

Last but not least the character whose meaning I am going to talk about is Nie Huaishang His entire name Huáisāng/怀桑 means “to hold mulberry leaves”.

In China, mulberry trees are planted because they are a staple food of silkworms to make silk

growing mulberries suggest wealth and security. This meaning suits Huaisang perfectly. He's someone who enjoys simple luxuries like keeping fans and hates to work hard love to live a comfortable life.

But there another aspect of his personality that of being a chess master who watches his plans go into fruition all the while watching comfortably at the side he manipulates and plans the events that take place in the story his process is like he’s spinning silk from behind the scenes. someone who sits comfortably in the background but spins the silk to manipulate the events in place.

This is only my interpretation of what the name means for the characters if you feel that this isn’t the case feel free to add or change. I am not an expert Chinese speaker so I apologize if I translated something wrong. I want to give a huge shout out to thisworldgodonlyknows who helped me create this post a huge thank you for helping me elaborate on the character’s names.

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