#meatbun can we talk

[yumemiruuuu]

Chu Wanning: You are driving a car and all of a sudden, there is an elderly woman and a young child crossing the road. What do you hit?

Mo Ran: (in deep thought)

Mo Ran: The elderly, because she already had her fill of life but the young child has barely experienced life yet so it would be a shame if he got killed.

Chu Wanning: …

Mo Ran: Or you can hit them both if you want to be a little silly

Chu Wanning: The BRAKES, Mo Weiyu. YOU HIT THE BRAKES.

#i was reading meatbun’s author’s notes outloud to my friend last night and like… Mo Ran is a racecar driver in a modern au #one of the mini theaters was like ‘‘0.5 MR: Late because he was busy killing an old lady who was walking too slow’’ #i can’t with this series I stg 😭 like every time I think about it I feel like I’m in a fever dream #meatbun can we talk #mxtx too can we talk… esp about the Yi City arc #I promise I won’t bite #i finally understand the jjk fandom with their lovehate relationship for gege akutami #mo ran #mo weiyu #the dumb husky #chu wanning #the husky and his white cat shizun #2ha incorect quotes #2ha #erha incorrect quotes #erha #erha he ta de bai mao shizun #二哈和的白貓師尊

[veliseraptor]

November Reading Recap

Banewreaker and Godslayer by Jacqueline Carey. Absolutely fascinating series, I want to dig into it with a shovel. Can't recommend it.

For one thing it contains one of the possibly most differently, weirdly racist depictions of brown people that I've read in a fantasy book recently (somewhat reminiscent of Aboriginal Australian stereotypes who exist because their ancestors were "burnt" that color as collateral damage in a battle of gods); it's decent in terms of writing quality but nothing terribly exceptional, and it's riffing as nakedly on Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion as Escape From the Bloodkeep was. Which is what makes it so fascinating to me - the way that it's looking at the same story (more or less) from the perspective of the god designated evil and his minions, and what it's doing with that - but again, while I want to excavate it and pick it apart, I wouldn't tell anybody to read it unless they were morbidly curious about it.

Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia. I saw a lot of raving about this book and was really excited about it, but ended up feeling kind of...not let down, it was a solid three star book, but I didn't like it as much as I hoped. Part of that is probably because I was in it for horror and it ended up feeling pretty light on the horror - heavier on the film history, which is fine, but Siren Queen did that part better. It was fine, I wouldn't not recommend it to someone who expressed interest in it, but I wouldn't particularly include it in my stand outs of the year either.

Remnants of Filth vol. 2 by Rou Bao Bu Chi Rou. Meatbun knows how to do (a) suffering and (b) fucked up relationships, and while this book's relationship isn't fucked up in quite the same "tailored perfectly to my interests" ways that 2ha was, it's pretty damn good. Very excited to see where this one goes.

Evidence of Things Seen: True Crime in an Era of Reckoning edited by Sarah Weinman. I was hoping for a little more from this than I got. It's pretty much just a collection of essays previously published online that come at true crime sometimes from a little more cautious/critical lens, but not in the way that I was hoping they would. I guess I was hoping for something that would be a more meta-examination of the genre and the issues it has, a little more introspective, but ultimately most of the essays were relatively straightforward true crime essays, just a little more thoughtful and with an eye toward a broader spectrum of stories than the "traditional" true crime stories. Not a bad collection, just not what I was hoping for/looking to read.

Was extremely funny to run into a surprise Michael Hobbes article that was very familiar from an episode of You're Wrong About, though.

The Haunting of Ashburn House by Darcy Coates. I enjoyed this one a bit less than the other Darcy Coates books I've read, but that's less its fault as a whole as it is "made use of loaded psychiatric language that I've grown increasingly uncomfortable with in reference to its villain" and I was just not totally on board with that. So I think as far as Darcy Coates books go it's probably my third favorite of three, but I still wouldn't not recommend it as a whole. It was certainly scary, and kept me reading the way that all her books have so far because I needed to know what was going to happen.

Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez. Sometimes I read a book and I'm like "I'm not sure I can say 'I liked this' but it sure did something to my brain and I think the something was positive, I want someone else to read this so I can talk to them about it" and that's why I'm giving this book to one of my sisters, because hopefully she will read it and then we can talk about it.

It was definitely a good book! It was a very good book. But saying "I liked it" feels sort of anodyne and quaint as a way of describing how I feel about it. It sort of reminds me of House of Leaves that way, which I guess is a recommendation in and of itself.

If anybody else reads this book please tell me what you think, I would like to discuss it with someone.

---

I'm currently reading Children of Memory by Adrian Tchaikovsky (so far a winner, as everything of his I've read has been), but I'm looking forward to trying to dip my toes back into some nonfiction with The Underworld by Susan Casey and Robert E. Lee and Me: A Southerner's Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause. Also need to read He, She, and It by Marge Piercy for my sci-fi book club. Other than that, I have a pretty open mind for what December's going to look like; since I'm going to my parents' house at the end of it I'll probably pick up something long-gone-unread from my old shelves there, which is always fun.

But I'm also considering making this the month I do my The Last Unicorn reread. We'll see how things play out.

#reading recaps #sometimes i read things

[iwanttofuckereh69]

Now reading: The husky and his white cat shizun

So i finished the first book. It's been what, not even a week? (EDIT: 2 fucking days since the og post i made) How am i supposed to wait till the rest is released if i keep swallowing them at this pace i feel like i still restrained myself but not enough ig

And like what, that last arc was utterly insane. Meatbun just tortures their leads, she's truly more cruel than Chu Wanning himself. It's not even characters in the world thats against them its just the author plainly tormenting them. That last scene … ehem spoilers for the first book here

…where Chu Wanning gets forced into Shi Mei's body? And he's going through all of that for Mo Ran while Mo Ran think its Shi Mei?

They just are so clueless, both of them. It's so tragic. The author just forces them into those situations rjuiefknhijugv And the fact we get POV's of both of them how they misinterpret each other's words and gestures… And as readers we can only silently scream at the book and observe the tragedy.

Getting back to my bullet points from the original post:

Chu Wanning is cruel AND pathetic but just like i mentioned earlier, not exactly like Mo Ran sees him. I still don't know how can he be both mean and kinda caring but only when nobody watches. I mean i get that its just that the level of his ruthlessness is scary. I still think his mom beat him as a kid for him to turn out this way

Mo Ran is dumb, i can't with him. I can't with how he doesnt realize why he is the way he is towards Chu Wanning, why he is so possessive. EVEN THAT DAMNED BROCADE BOX DIDN'T MAKE THAT LIGHTBULB IN HIS HEAD LIGHT UP. Great character, i love him but he is so utterly dumb...

Okay I can maaaaybe see why they will end up together, like everything seems like they are fated to be together. And Chu Wanning is pinning over him for whatever reason. But then i still believe in Mo Ran / Shi Mei supremacy. I love him being all lovey-dovey towards Shi Mei its just so adorable when he's talking about him or about his wontons. It still makes me giggle and kick my feet.

I have no idea what happened when Shi Mei died, it just seems unlikely Chu Wanning would be cruel like that. Probably Mo Ran was too dense to understand what was going on. There surely is more to Shi Mei, i'm just scared to think he's gonna turn out to be two faced.

Shi Mei is still my precious please don't be evil please don't be evil

i am convinced there will be a lot of pain and misery

WHAT THE FUCK WENT DOWN AT THAT LAKE

will i have enough strong will to wait some time before i get the 2nd vol

probably not

im gonna keep myself occupied with drawing Shi Mei <3333333333

#2ha #the husky and his white cat shizun #erha #now reading: 2ha #rambling

[owlyflufff]

“Akaashi, if you had to gift something extra special, what would it be?”

If Akaashi was going to be honest, being asked about his personal thoughts in the art of gift giving was not one of the kinds of questions he expected Bokuto to ever ask him.

Yet here he is, finishing the remains of a meatbun, sitting side by side with Bokuto under the shade of a tree and being asked just that.

“How extra are we talking Bokuto-san?” Akaashi prods, taking one final bite of his meatbun and tucking it safely for later disposal.

“I meannnnn,” Bokuto drawls on, stalling the idea a little longer than Akaashi suspects. “it doesn’t have to be EXTRA extra you know? Just enough to sorta surprise or make them happy is all.”

Akaashi pauses for a moment, unable to narrow and propose any ideas so he continues. “Well, usually you would go for something that person likes.”

“But that’s too basic! If I really wanna surprise them it has be something different, something that really makes them go ‘whoah!’ or ‘oh’, something-”

“Unexpected?” Akaashi asks. Bokuto stands up and points at him as if he’s hit the bullseye.

“That’s it Akaashi!” Bokuto says, triumph beaming across his face.

Unfortunately, that was where Akaashi was at fault line. For you see, Akaashi’s family has always been more “traditional”, gifting simplistic items like a book about poems, a vase with a beautiful flower arrangement and meaning behind it or simply a well prepared japanese bento box.

It’s not that Akaashi was particularly against his family’s ways but it came with the expense of him being unable to give things that he thinks people will like. He tries nonetheless, for Bokuto, he can at least try.

“Do you have anything in mind as of now?”

“Not really,” Bokuto swings his arms to and fro, practically in a standstill “I’ve been thinking about buying something, a book maybe? But nahhh, I don’t think it’s enough.”

“It’s the thought that counts Bokuto-san,” Akaashi can’t help but let a tinge of fondness surge into his words seeing Bokuto’s thoughtfulness. “The fact that you’re thinking about this person and what gift to give them in the first place is generous enough, I’m sure they’ll understand and appreciate your efforts just as much.”

There’s a glint in Bokuto’s eyes, “you think so?”

Akaashi can’t promise Bokuto, especially since he doesn’t even know to whom Bokuto is giving a gift too, but he can give a reassurance.

“I’m sure,” Akaashi says, not with the slightest hint of finality or exasperation, but affirmation.

There’s a smile forming on Bokuto’s lips and it’s all Akaashi needs to see before it sags momentarily, “I still want it to be personal though, I got to make it special somehow.”

Akaashi stands up from his place after a moment of thought, “if you don’t want to purchase something, then how about a handmade item instead?” 

“Oh! Like what exactly?” 

“Come with me and I’ll show you.” Akaashi says and he tries to pay no mind to Bokuto as his “Akaashi, don’t act all mysterious on me like this!” fades into the distance. 

It was a simple task really, whatever Akaashi had in mind involved them cutting colored paper into thin strips, numerous pieces were sprawled along the linoleum floor of their gym. The two of them were the only ones as of the moment, far earlier than anyone else in the volleyball club. 

“I’ve used to fold a lot of paper with my sisters before,” Bokuto says, cutting away at another sheet of paper, “we used to make a lotta paper planes and boats, but never like this.” 

“Just wait and see.” Akaashi says in return. They cut a few more pieces of paper before they lay it beside one another on the ground. Akaashi picks one up and scoots closer to Bokuto. 

“Here, watch.” Slowly and carefully Akaashi folds and weaves through the strip of paper, laying some portions on top of the other until it formed some sort of pentagon. 

“It’s very small,” Bokuto comments, curious as always. 

“You’d be surprised,” as if good timing, Akaashi proceeds to pinch the sides of the pentagon. It earns a small “huh?” from Bokuto before it turns into a series of awes. 

Before them was a makeshift paper star. A small one at that but the color of the paper added a certain beauty to it. 

“They’re origami lucky stars.” Akaashi says. He raises the little paper star up to look at his work before gently plopping it into Bokuto’s hands. “I’ve never actually received any before but my mother taught me how to make them. They say if you fold at least 100 of these and gift it to a person in a glass jar, the receiver can make a wish.” 

Something sparks within Bokuto, his smile awfully big for holding something so small. “This is so cool, a perfect gift even Akaashi!” 

“You’ll have to learn how to make them first before you can even gift one.” Akaashi points out as he hands over a strip of paper over to Bokuto. “How about you try, I’ll guide you along the way.” 

Bokuto beams, scooting a lot closer than Akaashi expected before, “I’d like that a lot actually.”

After much instruction, whining from Bokuto and an entire volleyball practice session later, Bokuto’s been able to fold at least 25 stars. A few failed attempts but it was better than nothing. 

The sun has already set and the gym had been locked by the time Bokuto and Akaashi leave the campus. Bokuto says nothing as he smiles and  looks down at the small stars in his hands. 

“I’m gonna head home and finish this as soon as possible, thanks again for the gift idea Akaashi, see you!” Bokuto sprints away and Akaashi waves, and that was that. The origami lucky stars never brought up again.

At least, that’s what Akaashi thought.

For after a few months have passed from the corner of his classroom, Akaashi can see resting on his desk was a small colorful jar. As he approached he could see the jar was jam packed with small colored stars. Yellow, blue and green stars made up the glass jar into a spiraling but colorful mess. 

Carefully, Akaashi picks up the jar to inspect it, attached to the top of the lid was a small paper tag that read “Thank you!”. Right beside it was a small drawing of a star. 

Akaashi knows this handwriting, he knows it better than anyone else. 

Practice had ended a lot earlier than the usual. A perfect window of opportunity for Akaashi. 

“Bokuto-san?” The latter jumps at his name, if the sky wasn’t dark Akaashi could have sworn he saw beads of sweat forming on Bokuto’s face. 

“I can’t help but ask, but did you leave this on my desk?” Akaashi takes out the small glass jar from his bag and shows it to him. It’s hard to tell whether Bokuto’s beaming in joy or squirming in fear. 

“Oh yeahhhh,” Bokuto looks at anywhere except at Akaashi. “It’s for you.” 

Akaashi has to backtrack momentarily, thinking about the stars, the small tag and it’s writing, the effort. “You made this for me?” 

“Yep!” 

“I...” Akaashi looks back and forth between the jar and its maker, “I don’t  understand Bokuto-san, it’s not my birthday-” 

“Oh no no no!” Bokuto moves frantically, “it’s not an early birthday gift, or Christmas one. I just- I just wanted to give it to you.”

Akaashi thinks, and he recalls about their old conversation. 

“Akaashi, if you had to gift something extra special, what would it be?”

Akaashi thinks and recalls and thinks and recalls until his head hurts and his urge for confirmation is far greater than anything else, “so the person you were gifting to....was me?” 

“Without a doubt, I wanted to give it to you as a thank you!”

The tag attached to the jar says that much and yet, ”why? A thank you...for what exactly?” 

“The thing is, you’ve been helping me out a lot with late night practices,” Bokuto shys away from his usual upbeat demeanor and there’s something more vulnerable, softer about this Bokuto in front of Akaashi. 

“Like you’ve been helping me out a LOT lot! And I don’t mind at all, but Washio’s been telling me not to trouble you and when I thought about it I think ‘huh, maybe I have been asking a bit too much from Akaashi’. So I decided, I should give you something in return for all that.”

“But Bokuto-sa-”

“I know! It would have been a lot easier to just say thank you but that would come off as boring, so I wanted to get you a physical gift but then...”

“Bokuto-sa-”

“I decided it would be way too unoriginal if I just bought you a book or something, you have a lot of those too! So I-”

“Bokuto-san!” Akaashi calls out, no harshness in his voice to scare Bokuto but loud enough to get his attention.

“Sorry! Yeah Akaashi? Did I mess up...?” Bokuto asks and it’s taking all of Akaashi’s restraint not to shake him by the shoulders and tell him he hasn’t done such. Especially right after giving him a gift of all things.

“Trouble? Bokuto-san, those late night practice sessions...you’ve never troubled me. I mean as far as that goes.” Akaashi says and as tame as it came out in his usual voice, it was far more honest than anything he had ever said. 

“But, surely I’ve been bothering you a lot haven’t I?” Bokuto goes on.

“Well yes, you have been asking for me to toss to you almost everyday, but it’s not that I mind.” Akaashi finds himself looking down at the ground, clutching unto the small jar with care. 

Afraid it would crack under the weight of this pressure, Bokuto included.

“It’s nice actually,” Akaashi says. “all those times, I quite enjoy your company Bokuto-san.” 

“Really?”

“Really, that’s why,” Akaashi takes a step forward and looks at Bokuto in the eyes, the stars glowing brighter than ever before. “You don’t have to thank me for anything, not when I want to do late night practices with you myself.” 

The thing about Bokuto is he always finds a way to comeback at Akaashi somehow, even if it had been a weak argument and yet Bokuto looks at him, and looks and looks and looks, practically buried in Akaashi’s gaze.

If Akaashi was a stronger man, he would have at it in him to let the moment last a little long. However, Akaashi was not in fact a stronger man so he looks away from Bokuto, trying to dismiss the warmth he feels within the cold. 

“You know,” Akaashi tilts the jar gently. “Since I’m sure you’ve spent so much time working on this, why don’t I make a wish right now?” 

Whatever Bokuto had been feeling not a few moments ago shifted into something eccentric, the Bokuto Akaashi knew well. “Wait! Like right here?!” 

“Right in this very spot.”

“Oh! Okay then I’ll just go over to the side and let you make yo-”

“No,” Akaashi calls out, surprised at his own insistence, “ please...stay, I’d like for you to hear it.”

Bokuto swirls back around, “oh, if you say so then sure!”

Akaashi brings the glass jar close. He shuts his eyes, he smiles. There’s no fear of being judged in front of Bokuto, with Bokuto it had always been a little easier. 

“I wish...to be able to spend more time with Bokuto-san.” 

Akaashi says with earnest, fondness, and if he ever had the chance to hear himself, he could have sworn he could sense the longing within it. 

By the time he opens his eyes, Bokuto Koutarou still stands in front of him, never once leaving. He wonders if the universe can grant him this much. 

“There, that’s my wish.” Akaashi says, looking for something, anything, a reaction from Bokuto as to make easy the situation. 

It comes in the form of frantic movements and brief stuttering before-

“A...AGHASHEEE!” Bokuto practically throws his arms around Akaashi and holds him close. Absolutely in no way letting go any sooner.

Should Akaashi not have held on the jar with all his might, it would have resulted in it falling and shattering to the ground.

Yet, with the way things were now, practically engulfed in Bokuto’s embrace, Akaashi thinks it’s worth it all the same.

#silly little idea I had <33 #Bokuaka giving each other gifts >>>>> anything else #A little bonus: there's exactly 101 stars in there #Which means: You Are The One #Bokuaka #Bokuaka fluff #Bokuto #Akaashi #Bokuto Koutarou #Akaashi Keiji #Haikyu!! #Haikyuu!! #Haikyu #Haikyuu #HQ #Elina's wholesome writing

[izartn]

Thinking about the setting of CFC again, and I know I said on my first post after reading the book that Meatbun should have just gone urban fantasy to get her kick with the more out there elements more plausibly, the scifi plot elements were the weakest on the book but...

You can tell she really wanted to go full on scifi, bc thinking about it, I think going full on 100-200 years on the future with he technology (no aliens or space travel super avaible except for like, maybe the moon or Mars) would have really aided both what she wanted to explore re:technology and the ways we use and abuse it, and her commentary on arts and fictional worlds.

Plus the pseudo superpowered He Yu and Xie Qingcheng and their resulting mental illness and infection by RN-13 would have fit better; maybe even targeting the way humanity has started to openly play with modifying genes and neuroplasticity.

Mandela as an ideology widespread and having to fight it. Making the matrix plan much more scary and plausible.

Like. The distopian sci-fi film noir of it all would have fit like a glove to what she's trying to do in the novel, and to her protags.

Come on, distopian scifi serves to amplify the worst and the best the same way historical fantasy does, and Meatbun loves to go to extremes from what we've read of her.

He Yu being raised by robot nannies that he loves until he realises/is explained they're just unfeeling programs and getting a bit of that real human connection with Xie Qingcheng? Poor wire monkey kid.

Realising "nobody" "real" cares for him would hit weirder here, if not harder. Getting a complex about having to program his own behaviour if he wants to fit and be loved by others! Pushing himself to master coding (he's a hacker in canon! Tie that even tighter to setting and plot and his emotional journey dammit), almost falling but then ruthlessly dismissing the false fantasies created by technology! In the way he does by the end of the book but hitting harder in this setting bc that unreality it's an element that's been there from the beginning.

He Yu having to deal with his hallucinations when he's on his lower moments in this version would also be even more also even more oomph, given people giving in to the technological ghosts would be something he's used to seeing. And then realising his own brain is creating that trap when he thought he was above deluding himself. Like he does in canon but you know. Tying it with the plot and setting better, which makes it hit harder.

You also just know the elite He Yu is born feom are on some hunger games almost capitol bullshit. HY deciding to study cinematography and arts in this kind of culture. Meatbun ripping apart the abuse of AI, tying in with her criticism of the lower common denominator re:fluffy simple stories.

Compare that to a Xie Chengqing even more determined that science has everything studied about human behaviour and emotions are just silly hormones that can robe one of control. At the same time rejecting the frivolous use of technology; finding unsuspecting common ground with He Yu despite it all. Mmm. His brand of condescending old fashioned machismo and general internalised homophobia (and He Yu's if we're talking about it) (although in He Yu case it could just be denial of XQC in specific though which would be hilarous/sad considering. all of the story) would be maybe more difficult to translate but honestly humanity is such a shit show that I would buy we having regressed and then progressed again on the human rights front. Anyway it's more about his unhealthy repression, controlling tendencies, and trying to be good at being human by societal standards, for his sister and master/prpfessor/adopted father. That can be explored perfectly on this setting regardless.

Maybe it's the aftermath of a conflict and that's why people are so crazy about Mandela! Collective trauma around incomprehensible loss. Human nature at his most basic need for love and companionship vs survival, like Meatbun likes.

The more I think about this the more I like it. Mmm. Did censure prevent Meatbun of going all out with the scifi? Because it really really fits.

#bing an ben #case file compendium #cfc meta #meta #he yu #xie chengqing #my thoughts #hexie #give me hexie or give me death #XQC smoking old fashioned cigarettes hitting harder when vapers or other forms of benevolent drugging and killing oneself are in fashion #choosing the honesty of the slow self destruction inherited from the old man who saved and gave purpose to his life before dying #the deliberatedness of it in that unconscious way of xqg #where he knows exactly what he's doing without thinking about what he's doing #he yu trying to programmed a false XQC at the heights of his most unhinged obssesed moments and destruying it all in fury bc #it not the same #the warmth of that skin the cold on his eyes the rare unguarded fletting moments of fondness #human actors being compared to holograms #He Yu being his most messy authentic self full on an emotional mess contested even more sharply against this superficial technological WORLD #pulling Xie Qingcheng to that same raw honesty bit by bit hurt by hurt and kindness by kindness #as painstakingly as in canon for both of them #GAH

[duckprintspress]

"Get to Know Me" Tag Meme

Oh gosh, this is the first time we've ever been tagged for a meme! Thank you for thinking of us, @felinesomnambulist. I SUPPORT YOUR MICHELANGELO LOVE, he's the best turtle and April should see that.

I'm gonna fill this out based on me (@unforth) since I run this account (And, ya know, own the Press). :D

Three Ships: Hua Cheng/Xie Lian (Tian Guan Ci Fu by Mo Xiang Tong Xiu), Mo Ran/Chu Wanning (The Husky and His White Cat Shizun by Meatbun Doesn't Eat Meat), Shen Qiao/Yan Wushi (Thousand Autumns by Meng Xi Shi), are probably my three favorite ships right now.

First Ever Ship: oh god. if we're talking "first couple I remember getting really invested in," it's Min/Rand al'Thor from the Wheel of Time. If it's "the first ship I can remember being like 'I ship this' and it wasn't canon and it's queer and stuff" (though I have Opinions about Min and queerness, but that's a different conversation)...hmm...I wrote a little Nuriko/Yuki Miaka (Fushigi Yuugi by Yuu Watase) and Lina Inverse/Gourry Gabriev (Slayers). (Lina/Gourry isn't queer in canon, but there is no cis het explanation for Nuriko). I also had a ship for The Franchise By She Who I Wish Would Just Fucking Stop Being Awful but we don't speak of such things anymore. (I also, early, wrote a lot of self-insert OC x "my favorite character in each franchise" things, like in middle school I wrote a story with my OC x the son of Garion and C'Nedra from the Belgariad by David Eddings).

Last Song: Ateez - Deja Vu (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlnMDttgTbk)

Currently Reading: Mo Du by Priest (https://edanglarstranslations.com/modu)

Currently Watching: I guess The Sleuth of Ming Dynasty? I watch things incredibly slowly, basically only when I'm packaging campaign merch, and we've only had the pin campaign recently so I haven't had much time in ages. I've also been watching TLT2 on and off. Counting things I'm watching with the kids, we're doing our second full watch-through of Kipo and the Age of the Wonderbeasts (which by the way? super queer. y'all should check it out, it's great.)

Currently Consuming: Black cherry herbal tea

Currently Craving: at least one good night of sleep, god I'm tired (see also: why I'm doing a meme instead of editing, lmao).

Tag 9 people we want to get to know better! Um... @sarnakhwritesthings, @theleakypen, @scones-and-texting-and-murder, @jemariel, @deathbycoldopen, @wolffyluna, @faerytaleonfire, @foxofninetales, and @veronicasanders

#tag meme #duck prints press #tag us in memes i guess #i'll do um if i have time lmao #as opposed to on my main account where i never have time and never do

[layzeal]

okay guys, you've been hearing me talk about yuwu for a while, and i'm very glad interest in it is rising!! so, how can you read it?

the most direct link we have is either the Stains of Filth carrd (34 chapters translated, rest is edited mtl), or the Remnants of Filth carrd (full translation)

but the problem becomes very clear once you click it

the Edited MTL (which is very good and reads like a full translation!) has been removed because 1. meatbun announced that yuwu was licensed (likely by 7s), BUT we haven't received an official announcement yet 2. the full english translation with proof of purchase was finished

that full english translation.... has also been removed

so now we have neither Edited MTL, nor unofficial translation, nor official translation :')

however, after a lot of digging i was able to find a repost of the Edited MTL! (which again, is very good!)

BUT BEFORE I LINK IT. please please please support the author on jjwxc! this helps yuwu get even more licenses and even the chance of adaptations! (guide) (raws)

i tried to reach out to the Edited MTL creator and explain the situation, but haven't received an answer, which is why the only other option i can give everyone for now is this repost of the Edited MTL.

i'll edit this post once more options show up, but unfortunately this seems to be the only one now. again, i beg you all to support the original author. these novels are very cheap, and if you use AliPay, you can even choose the amount of credits you buy! (instead of buying $17 on one go)

#i'm not gonna be putting this one in the tag. i rly only mean this for my followers #hopefully we'll get other options soon but for now that's all we've got rip #lace speaks

[deng-yi-deng]

someone on the gc commented that "even reading the MTL you can tell how good the writing is!"

no, no you can't. the MTL is garbage. it's garbage for all 3 Chinese webnovels i've tried to read. they have all given me headaches. there is a reason we have professional translators and their jobs are DIFFICULT.

And the novel they were talking about....sigh. So many people love it, but then again girls on the gc are also always talking about novels making them cry, and I am continually baffled. Black Moonlight made you cry? It's a collection of ideas for a novel, not a novel. It barely works as a script outline. It's not that good.

Meatbun isn't Tolstoy, or Le Guin, or [fill in your favorite published author]. She substituted a complicated and tortuous narrative for narrative complexity. 2ha is overly long, with weird tone changes, and is incredibly heavy handed with the angst. Lots of ppl seem to love that approach, but how am I, a mere human, supposed to relate to characters or situations that are so extreme? Reading about a character getting a papercut? I wince - it's relatable. Reading about a character walking up a mountain of corpses? Nope. There is a way to make it relatable, but you need to describe the experience of the characters more intimately rather than continually introducing ever more extreme numbers - more bodies, more steps. In the end there is less impact because the volume was turned up way too high.

#you know what this is about and i'm complaining here because i still need to complain about it #it's because everyone keeps calling it a masterpiece and it. isn't. you just love it which is fine but don't mistake it for genius

[binghelogy]

Summer to summer, I want to hold your hand (23602 words) by KiwisMaybe Chapters: 1/1

Fandom: 二哈和他的白猫师尊 - 肉包不吃肉 | The Husky and His White Cat Shizun - Meatbun Doesn't Eat Meat

Rating: General Audiences

Warnings: Major Character Death

Relationships: Chu Wanning/Mo Ran | Mo Weiyu

Characters: Chu Wanning, Mo Ran | Mo Weiyu

Additional Tags: Xue Zhengyong - Freeform, Madam Wang - Freeform, Xue Meng | Xue Ziming - Freeform, Inspired by Hotarubi no Mori e, Alternate Universe - Hotarubi no Mori e Fusion, Bittersweet Ending, Hopeful Ending, Maybe ooc but guilty as charged haha, Falling In Love, Rice Cake Spirits as plot devices, A Very Self-Indulgent Fic, Tai if you're reading this this is me giving you a hug, Not beta read we die like 0.5, If you've watched the movie you know how it ends (or do you?)

Summary:

The spirit stops, and Mo Ran brakes as fast as he can, not wanting to cross the minimum distance between them that he self-imposed. When he turns, the willow vine is back in his hand, and Mo Ran fears for a second that even just talking was unacceptable. But he just finds himself being offered the end of it, instead. When he looks up confused, the spirit’s grip on the handle of the willow whip grows shaky. “Grab it.” He says, then grows impatient when Mo Ran takes too long to react. “Hold onto it so you won’t get lost.

 A Hotarubi No Mori E about a teenaged Mo Ran befriending a masked spirit called Chu Wanning after getting lost in a forest, and the summers that follow.

#ki fanfics #Summer to summer I want to hold your hand #ranwan #Hotarubi no Mori E AU #the husky and his white cat shizun #2HA #AO3 #Fanfiction

[veliseraptor]

February Reading Recap

Getting to this one real late but it's fine because I only read three books in February anyway.

Episode Thirteen by Craig DiLouie. I'm a sucker for books that are doing something interesting with format, and this one caught me with the "ghost hunting TV show episode" format and then surprised me a little by being both better and scarier than I expected. I don't think I'd say that it's among the best horror I've read, but it was a good time, and spooky, and left enough of the "what's going on" vague and undefined for me to appreciate it.

There's at least one interesting thing that the author did with the format that I completely missed, though (having to do with time stamps, so that's on me for never paying a lot of attention to time stamps). Makes me wonder a little what else I might've missed. This author wrote another horror novel I've seen floating around (The Children of Red Peak), and I enjoyed this one enough that I'll probably give it a read.

The Husky and His White Cat Shizun: vol. 2 by Meatbun Doesn't Eat Meat. I'm still in very familiar territory with this one so far based on what I remember from the first time I read it, but it is (as with most cnovels) definitely rewarding reread with the benefit of hindsight. I am very much enjoying it, still, and finishing this volume kicked me into trawling AO3 for fanfiction, so I feel like that speaks well of the experience.

The drawback (one of the drawbacks) to this novel being so damn long is that we're not really in a part of it that I have particularly strong feelings about, and because of the novel's length it's also going to be a minute before we get to the parts that I do remember having strong feelings about. me @ Ye Wangxi though: 👀

The Glory of the Empire by Jean d'Ormesson. This book is both fascinating and very hard for me to figure out how to talk about. The conceit is quite possibly my favorite thing about it - this book is written as a narrative history of a completely fictional empire, in the style of (classically) Herodotus or Suetonius, but in more modern terms I think was meant to evoke Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, which I haven't read. I wonder what would be different (or not) about my experience reading this book if I had that background, since I do feel like this is a text that is very much existing in deliberate conversation with those it is playing off.

I imagine I do not have to explain to the Goncharov website why this is a fascinating exercise. It's a history! Of an entirely made up empire! Including citations of articles and books and asides about different interpretations/the relevance of new "discoveries" to the author's argument. It's conceptually fascinating. It also reads as (not to put too fine a point on it) orientalist and bordering on racist in the way it talks about real cultures external to the one being imagined. It is possible that is on purpose as part of the author's project, since it does very much feel in keeping with the texture of the genre d'Ormesson is pastiching here, but also it is possible that it's just an artifact of this being a book written in French in the 1970s, and it's hard for me to say how much it is one or the other. Certainly for some people it might not matter at all; for me it would make a substantial difference.

Anyway, fascinating book, still not sure what to make of it, kind of want to shove it at other people I know and go "here read this and talk to me about it."

Presently I am reading Eyes of the Void by Adrian Tchaikvosky which I am (unsurprisingly) really enjoying (I can probably call him one of my favorite authors at this point); I have a whole bunch of scattered things I'm looking at reading next and no clear idea where I'm going to land, though I do think I might try to get into finishing my Wheel of Time reread soon.

#reading recaps #sometimes i read things

[dangermousie]

Hi....can I ask, who are your top 5 (or top 3) favorite characters from 2ha? And why? And what are your top 5 fav moments from the novel?...Thanks.....

A 2ha ask!!! I love this! Thank you, Anon, I love having excuses to talk about 2ha all day.

OK, my top 5 characters

5. Shi Mei/Hua Binan - he doesn’t count as a favorite character because I want to drive a spike through his eye but he is such an interesting character for me because of so many things:

(1) Meatbun’s commitment to her theory of redemption/repentance - anyone can repent and start on the road to redemption, all it takes is a sincere heart (we see Shi Mei do this near the end),

(2) how nothing is predestined/we are our choices - Shi Mei and Hua Binan start with the same premise and same goals but they wildly diverge ultimately because Shi Mei sees his future self and eventually takes it as a warning sign instead of a welcome mat (it’s an even better example of this than Mo Ran and Taxian Jun because it was never Mo Ran’s choice to become TXJ)

(3) the concept that abusers will create their own monsters -most times if you mistreat someone over and over, they are not going to grow up saintly. One universe got wiped out and another almost did because Shi Mei, whose people were dehumanized, decided to dehumanize the humans right back

(4) I find Hua Binan’s pathology so interesting - he genuinely believes he’s done nothing wrong and has killed nobody - he is puzzled and indignant when CWN accuses him of mass slaughter - “I killed nobody, it was Taxian Jun” he says and is sincere; the disconnect between the fact that TXJ had as much volition as a stick in it and carried out Hua Binan’s orders is surreal. And of course the depersonalization - he depersonalizes others as much as his people had been (as I mentioned) and that extends even to those nice to him - he views CWN as a toy for his sexual wishes (and he only was prevented from turning him into an evil zombie by Mo Ran’s sacrifice) and he genuinely enjoyed hurting Mo Ran who did nothing wrong to him and came from a background as abused as his own. His brain has more compartments than a fancy dresser. He is an interesting example of concept that Meatbun seems to subscribe to - being a victim does not necessarily make you a good person and having a nice life doesn’t necessarily make you bad and nothing justifies bad deeds. Explains, yes. Justifies, no.

4. Nangong Si and Xue Meng - I am combining them because for all their differences, the thing that I like is that Meatbun subverts the “spoiled young master is evil and useless and will be obstacle to our noble hero” trope. Xue Meng grew up with love and wonderful parents and he’s immature and spoiled but good-hearted. There is nothing glorious in abuse, Meatbun seems to say - it’s not character building, it’s not anything but awful. Xue Meng has the best parents in the novel and in a way, he is the most adjusted. And I still remember reading the scene where they are escaping from the Willow and it promises him the last magic sword (and Xue Meng believes that without such a weapon, he can never achieve much as a cultivator) for killing Mo Ran because, the willow points out, he is jealous of Mo Ran and dislikes him. I was unspoiled and went “aha, here is where betrayal happens.” And Xue Meng doesn’t even pause - he stabs the willow instead. Even though it means never having a proper weapon because he is morally sane and his bickering with Mo Ran is the usual cousin fighting among teens with different personalities, not a path to murder. And I may have screamed into my hands.

And Nangong Si is rather the same. He is once again, a seemingly spoiled heir of the most powerful sect. And he turns out to be a good-hearted, straight as an arrow young man who will do the right thing no matter what it costs him and whose death was the only non Ranwan related scene that made me bawl in the novel.

3. Ye Wangxi - she is the character who is most true to herself and consistent and unbendable throughout. In a novel full of broken people (some who start this way and some who get that way), she stands alone as completely unbowed - I cannot imagine ANYTHING breaking her. In 0.5 timeline the fall of the cities did not, in this life Nangong Si’s death did not. Her stepfather’s betrayal did not. The crowd gossiping and dragging her name through the mud could not. There is a reason Mo Ran is a literal fanboy for her. And I find it so interesting that the character most centered about what she is and isn’t is one who has the most ambiguous gender identity - living as a man for so long, then brief potential as a woman, and then back to ambiguity after Nangong Si’s death - I like it because whatever identity she inhabits, the core of who she is, is what matters and the wrapping is immaterial (and one of the reasons I love Nangong Si so much btw is that he loved Ye Wangxi for being Ye Wangxi; whatever body she inhabited was immaterial to him.)

2. Chu Wanning - I love Chu Wanning so much. Many other authors would have have made him beautiful and self-sacrificing and called it a day but CWN is far from an abused genius saint. He is thin-skinned, proud, finicky, quick to temper, awkward, yearning, embarrassed, insecure. He feels real. And Meatbun never forgets (same as she does not with all her other characters) the reverberations of upbringing and trauma throughout your whole life - his childhood where he was fed and protected but also utterly dehumanized and expected to be perfect, both - plays such a role in everything for him - from his genuine belief that he’s unlikeable and unloveable, to his strict standards for everyone and everything, even his attitude to desire. He rescues Mo Ran over and over - as a child from starvation, on the steps, from the flower etc. But Mo Ran rescues him right back over and over - from the flower and from the underworld yes, but emotionally as well - from feeling unloved, from being alone, from living not like a person.

Also, he is almost unique in the novel in having a genuine sense of justice. Even our good guys treat people differently depending on whether they are friends or foes or w/e, let alone the bad guys, but in a world where Rufeng Sect takes protection money and if you don’t have it, too bad, enjoy being eaten by ghosts, Chu Wanning applies the same rules to everyone - he treats himself as harshly as he does everyone else. The thing that sticks in my mind is after they come back from the ghost town and he asks for punishment because he assaulted the client (the scene where the gross client says “I paid, you have to do X” and CWN drops the money back at him and then goes at it was the precise moment I irrevocably fell in love with him) and his fellow master is all !!!! because everyone knows that while rules are technically the same for everyone they are really not, not for a master like CWN who every sect would like to have. CWN really is the only person in the novel (except possibly Chu Xun) who believes in treating everyone the same. Which is what makes his confronting the whole cultivation world for Mo Ran and killing cultivators to get to him all the more !!!!

1. Mo Ran - Ahhhh, is it any surprise he is first place. Mo Ran is not just my favorite character in the novel, he is my favorite character in any web novel and in my Top 10 favorite characters from anywhere. So many reasons but ultimately it comes down that he is unique for me in feeling real as someone who lives somewhere - he feels utterly and completely as a real person. The rest of them are characters. Complex and cool ones, sure. But Mo Ran is the only one who transcends that (honestly, the only one in any web novel I’ve read) and I can imagine walking past him on the street.

But there is so much else there - he is an example of how much potential for both horror and nobility there is in a person - the same person became the world-destroying monster that was Taxian Jun and the hero that was Mo Zongshi (and yes, the flower turned him into TXJ, but the flower takes one’s darkest impulses, so TXJ 0.5 is all the worst potentialities in Mo Ran realized.) There is his sense of humor, his layers of trauma that cover more layers of trauma (I love that right adjacent to the reveal about the flower, she gives us the reveal about arson/murder committed by the actual Mo Ran - Mo Ran IS very very messed up even before Shi Mei decides to go for broke), the fact that on reread it becomes clear that the journey from Taxian Jun 0.5 to Mo Ran 2.0 is just as much reversion as change - you witness Mo Ran’s reversion to his default setting - what he would have been without the flower ever interfering. In a way it’s like detox, aided by his guilt and remorse. I also love the whole narrative where Meatbun redeems him slowly and painfully and it’s never fast or easy; and she never lets you forget the horrors he did - it would be convenient but she sprinkles them through the narrative. If you buy his redemption, you will damn well do it in light of full knowledge of what he needs redemption for. She only reveals he is the greatest victim in this after you buy the redemption (and people love or hate the flower reveal but I love it so much because so many things only fall into place after it - no way anyone who genuinely was as unhinged as Taxian Jun was before his suicide would turn into Mo Ran 1.0 who as the worst thing he does is rob a prostitute. Where are the rivers of blood? And also because this was the only way for Mo Ran to get on the road of forgiving himself.)

There is also the reverberations of his trauma from childhood - like why food is his love language, the slow gentleness of 2.0 relationship with CWN, the duality of Taxian Jun versus Mo Ran where 0.5 is his darkest impulses but 2.5 in the extras is really a manifestation of his trauma, and I love that he doesn’t integrate because to me it’s not just Taxian Jun who doesn’t want to, I think Mo Zongshi doesn’t either because he can’t accept his past fully and this is a safe way to separate. Plus knowing/seeing Chu Wanning loving the TXJ fragment as much as he loves the rest of Mo Ran is the sole way to truly convince Mo Ran that yes, CWN loves Mo Ran in any iteration and accepts all of him, even the darkest and most damaged parts (which is a symmetry with CWN being the literal keeper of Mo Ran’s memories which is the sole way to truly convince him how utterly Mo Ran adores him - they heal and compliment the other’s damage/most vulnerable spots through these.)

OK, I am gonna stop before I write a dissertation.

Top 5 scenes

Oh god, there is no way I can limit it to 5! I suppose I could scream about all the amazing shocking reveals - I literally screamed when Taxian Jun showed up in the 2.0 timeline - like how?! It turned everything I thought was going on upside down. The thing with Mo Ran taking the flower for shizun, to protect him killed me (especially since as a result he ended up the one who hurt him the most. That terrifying irony) or the scene where Mo Ran sees Chu Wanning play guqin at the party, flashbacks to 0.5 timeline noncon and is wondering “but CWN is a good person, why did I even do any of these things, I must have been mad!” as he understands the reason for his past self less and less and on reread, you feel the puzzle piece slam into place etc etc but in terms of sheer emotion:

5. Mo Ran 2.0 and CWN eating together in the sect. I love this so much - Mo Ran breaching CWN’s loneliness and showing his adoration in practical ways - making sure he eats etc. And the thought he puts into it - he figures out how to coax him to eat - when he’s not blinded by aftereffects of the flower, Mo Ran has an excellent EQ. Just the whole thing about CWN having all his care unstintingly returned, being the one cared for, the way MR tailors himself to CWN’s tastes (giving up spice and picking up sweets) not being a sacrifice but more a combination of MR genuinely experiencing more pleasure sharing with CWN than eating spice and rediscovery of his original taste (I remember MR once saying he loved sweet things but nobody would buy it for him. I wonder how much of his love of spice is genuine and how much tailoring himself to sect tastes. Mo Ran can be a chameleon thanks to his abusive upbringing where he had to please to survive.) But also the whole bit where MR always wolfs his food down because how he believes subconsciously good things will be taken away from him and then CWN sees and silently brings him more soup and it sinks in to MR that perhaps he doesn’t have to wolf things down, perhaps the good things won’t be taken away (and the fact that it’s done by CWN who MR 1.0 believed looked down on his eating habits while Shi Mei did not when the truth is the opposite!) And how it echoes in the extras where Taxian Jun (who still eats like that - the whole bit where he eats up all the wontons CWN made to last for weeks is funny but also sad) has his own soup moment - when he finds out that CWN fixed and healed all the trees TXJ planted that blew down in the storm - and he realizes that he can be safe in his good things, CWN will guard them for him.

4. Mo Ran’s nightmare as he wanders the world and how in his dreams CWN is there to help with the light. That whole sequence is heartbreaking, and conveys his guilt and remorse and longing and his reliance on CWN so much.

3. Wontons reveal - when Mo Ran realizes who made them and he’s there clutching the hems of ghost CWN robes and bent over and you can feel his heart being eaten up. But also, the fact that CWN’s regret was not going to Mo Ran and not telling him they were his is heart-breaking but also this is what keeps his soul on earth long enough for Mo Ran to be able to absorb it into the lantern and thus go to underworld and eventually reunite all the three souls and thus save CWN and eventually this saves the universe. And the little kicker that Mo Ran thinks things would have been different if they knew and it’s only thousands of pages later we find out it wouldn’t have mattered - because flower took all the volition away but also because even in the original timeline, when MR had no idea and thought CWN just whipped him for no reason and didn’t even care, he still volunteered to take the flower for CWN, begged for the privilege - if not for the flower, they’d have talked and it would have come out (wontons) and etc etc. I kinda wish I could read that AU.

2. The core removal thing and surrounding stuff - especially CWN descending on the dragon and standing against the whole cultivation world for Mo Ran. The man who always cherished his face and the rules. But all of it - the way the mob is portrayed as not knowing or caring about Mo Ran but him being a symbol of them feeling righteous and superior and forgetting about their dreary lives, the way Mo Ran, even in utter hell, being basically tortured to death for the pleasure of the crowd, is still wondering if he did enough to expiate. Just all of it.

1. Good Night, Mo Ran - ch 279 made me imitate a Victorian hysteric deprived of laudanum but it’s a sheer amazing tour de force of writing and character/relationship stuff. The peace and devastation and the fact that Mo Ran’s heart stops and CWN doesn’t feel the precise moment because of noise of snow/branches cracking just gets the whole terror of a small moment changing everything and ending everything and CWN cooking anyway because he knows MR can’t bear to waste food so of course he’d wake up and just...I am gonna stop now.

ETA: this is not a favorite scene per se but I will never be over the fact that the first thing Taxian Jun did once his mind and heart and will were his own for the first time in decades is go to CWN’s side and save CWN and save the world (for CWN but not just for CWN - look at his gentleness with the old servant.) That is just!!!!!

#asks #cnovel #2ha #meatbun doesn't eat meat

[yuyuntianyu]

[2HA analysis blog] To love you is torment but leave you I cannot

I wanted to write this (hopefully not-too-long) blog to give 2HA fandom a different perspective of the events in the past timeline. I noticed that there are many little things that could not be carried over to the English language. These little things can give more explanations to our characters’ actions so I hope sharing this would help the novel make more sense. This blog focuses on Taxian-jun and Chu Fei.

Warning: Spoilers ! ! ! Taxian-jun and Chu Fei are their own trigger warnings ! ! !

Despite the novel having 350 chapters, we really know little about what happened between Taxian-jun and Chu Fei besides the abuse and mistreatment and that little is relayed to us by the Most Unreliable Narrator of the Cultivation World - Mo Ran Mo Weiyu. If we only take Mo Ran for his words then a lot of his and Chu Wanning’s decisions told later on would seem irrational and almost silly. So let’s dive deep in the past so we can understand how the great cultivator Beidou Xian-zun could raise such a dumb husky since the events in the past would explain the more irrational decisions made by both main characters.

Given Mo Ran’s narrator is about as reliable as his character in the first 120 chapters, we have to look at other more subtle clues and some of them are due to cultural and linguistic differences.

1. I used to like you a lot

At his coronation day, Taxian-jun stated that he once greatly looked up to Chu Wanning and that he used to love and respect him dearly. Maybe I am reading into this too much but this is my theory: The flower could erase the memory itself but cannot erase the feelings associated with the memory. He had his memories of the good deeds Chu Wanning did for him erased but still remembered that he used to love and respect him. It doesn’t make sense unless it is indeed that the flower could not erase its host’s feelings. So throughout the novel, Mo Ran’s complicated emotions are complicated possibly because he could not remember how he came to have these feelings. Similarly, Hua Binan could mess with the undead Taxian-jun’s memory to a great extent but could not erase his obsession with Chu Wanning.

2. I gave you a new title

Chu Fei. 楚妃. In the Imperial Chinese harem hierarchy, “Fei” means consort and not concubine (嬪 “Pín"). Consorts were highly respected positions in the palace weidling much political power and were only seconds to the Empress Consort. Another major difference is a consort would be married to the emperor while a concubine would not. So if Taxian-jun had truly wanted to only humiliate Chu Wanning and keep him for the carnal pleasures (I am intentionally ignoring his breeding kink completely), he would keep him as a concubine but he gave Chu Wanning the Consort title and hid him from the world. At this point, Taxian-jun had almost lost Chu Wanning once and had spent a lot of effort to bring him back from the verge of death after hearing Chu Wanning’s apology so his anger might have softened a bit. Also, given that Chu Wanning is a man, having a legitimate offspring ( (I am still intentionally ignoring Mo Ran's breeding kink completely) is not an issue so although this is not clearly stated, I believe Taxian-jun wanted to force a relationship and somewhat proper marriage on Chu Wanning. Another hint of this is in an Extra chapter where Taxian-jun tried to get Chu Wanning a birthday gift. He recalled that in his past timeline, he had wanted Chu Wanning to give him something on his birthday as well and that he had wanted Chu Wanning’s heart.

3. Shizun likes to write letters and poems

On Book 3 Chapter 247, Chu Wanning sat down and wrote a few unsent letters to the people he used to know. He also wrote a few lines of poetry. In the first few lines taken from different literature works, he expressed his sense of helplessness and his wish to remain untainted despite the circumstances. The more important two lines are from a poem written by a real poet named Fàn Chéngdà ( 范成大) who lived in the 12th century Southern-Song dynasty. The two lines read:

“May I be like the stars, may you* be as the moon. Night after night, may we shine together side by side.” **

*In the original work, the character used instead of you is “jun” 君 (as in 踏仙君 Taxian-jun). 君 could mean king, emperor, lord, or gentleman ** This is my rough translation - I haven’t found an English version of this poem

These two lines are commonly used in romantic novels as a way to express one’s unchanging love and loyalty to another person despite the circumstances. He compared himself as the stars and wanted to remain by Taxian-jun whom he viewed as the moon. Chu Wanning wrote this to express his willingness to stay but he would never voice this out loud. In the next timeline, he did the same thing by quietly loving and caring for Mo Ran 1.0 despite the mistreatment and was content with never expressing his feelings vocally. Mo Ran was rather uneducated and thus could not fully comprehend these two lines and misunderstood that Chu Wanning was missing Xue Meng.

4. You are all I have left

In chapter 252, after Chu Wanning returned to The Red Lotus Pavilion, he found Taxian-jun already waiting for him. Taxian-jun told Chu Wanning about a dream he had and said:

“I am afraid I don’t resent you… I want to resent you… Otherwise, I…” “In the end, it’s just you and I”.

This is not the first time he expressed that Chu Wanning was all he had left or they only had each other. I believe that at this point, Taxian-jun might have somewhat believed Chu Wanning and recognized that his memories were missing. His words and behaviors seemed a lot more gentle and he mentioned they did have periods of time where their marriage was easier. I believe it was after this point. He told us about the numerous times he attempted to spoil his consort or expressed his affection through gifts, a trip outside the palace, goods, jewels, and even teaching Chu Wanning how to cook or personally taking care of Chu Wanning when he was sick. At one point, Taxian-jun expressed his wish for a more peaceful marriage with Chu Wanning through his breeding kink by saying that if they had children, perhaps they would be more civil towards each other.

Edit: I really wanted to go about this blog without having to refer to their particular taste in bed

5. Are you still mad?

This is a smaller detail but in the original text and the Vietnamese official translation, the way they talked to each other had a bit more of the “husband-wife” dynamic. Especially Chu Wanning ( l┐(︶▽︶)┌ ), the comment section said he sounded like when your wife is mad that you didn’t take out the trash but still says: “I’m not mad” and Taxian-jun, the husband, would come around and ask “Are you still mad at me?” after every fight.

6. I did not think you would really leave me.

On Chapter 99, Mo Ran recalled the fight between him and Chu Wanning after an assassination attempt. In order to convince Mo Ran to not go to Taxue Palace, Chu Wanning said:

“If you destroy Taxue palace, if you kill Xue Meng, I will die before you”.

Now the line “I will die before you” in my language is less of a suicidal ideation but more of a threat. It's used when a person already knows that they are important to the other person and is using their own death as a threat to make the other person do something. This line is thrown around a lot during heated arguments between people close to each other but they almost never mean it. (Even my mom said it numerous times before T_T . I personally think it’s manipulative). Therefore, it is understandable Taxian-jun did not take this line seriously and replied almost mockingly. After all, they had been married for almost a decade at that point, Taxian-jun probably felt somewhat comfortable that Chu Wanning would not do anything reckless. He could not foresee that Chu Wanning meant what he said and actually followed through with his words. I believe that if Taxian-jun had known that Chu Wanning was serious, Taxian-jun would not have gone to Taxue Palace. 7. Don't leave me, ok?

Then Chu Wanning died and Mo Ran spent two years alone. In those two years, we know he basically went insane because of grief, talked to a corpse everyday, and deep fried his Empress Consort. But strangely enough, Mo Ran 1.0 did not immediately mention this after being reborn although it was the main reason he committed suicide. And at that point, it had been well over a decade since Shi Mei faked his death in the past timeline, yet Mo Ran 1.0 seemed to still hold a lot of resentment towards Chu Wanning. Also, he said he could accept Shi Mei’s death but would never accept Chu Wanning’s. So honestly, it did not make sense to me the first time I read the novel and I believed Mo Ran resented Chu Wanning for a different reason.

The answer was first hinted at in chapter 9 when Mo Ran scolded the sleeping Chu Wanning. He called Chu Wanning a donkey hoof (lol) and this is actually an idiom to scold someone who is disloyal and unfaithful in love. The puzzles came together when the undead Taxian-jun showed up and immediately went after Chu Wanning (and not Shi Mei). He believed Chu Wanning used his death to hurt him and was angry at Chu Wanning for leaving him. This is the resentment Mo Ran 1.0 carried over to the next timeline. He hated Chu Wanning for abandoning him. This is solidified in chapter 262 by the undead Taxian-jun pleading to Chu Wanning:

“Don’t betray me” “Don’t leave me the second time. The first time you left, I could choose death as a relief. This time, even death is not an option any more… I won’t be able to bear it…”

So there it is! I hope this blog brings some new information and feel free to discuss! Let me know if you have any questions for me ＼(￣▽￣)／

Disclaimer: Plenty of this is my conclusion drawn from the already ambiguous original text and various translations. Unless Meatbun says it, it’s not canon. I am looking at the novel in three different languages so I might have made some mistakes. Pls forgive. Also, I am not making excuses for Mo Ran 0.5’s actions nor am I justifying the abuse in any way. Chu Wanning never said Mo Ran 0.5 was innocent of these crimes nor will I.

#2ha #the husky and his white cat shizun #chu wanning #mo ran #mo weiyu #ranwan #taxian jun #chu fei #erha #husky is dumb but husky tried his best

[momoliee]

It’s probably too early for The Meta No One Asked For That I’m Gonna Write Anyway about XQC, alas…here we go

Dr. Xie Qingcheng, 32, male, straight (so far), 180 cm with only one current family member.

Xqc is introduced as a cold, aloof and apathetic retired doctor who has no passions, cares about nothing except for his sister, and unless he’s angry, you can barely get an emotional response out of him.

Through meatbun’s character notes on how he has no favorite food, no favorite color or animal, no personal preferences outside what’s most practical and how he’s very very responsible and rules abiding and honest and sober and serious, and through he yu’s POV that continuously paints him as this heartless cold blooded person, I dare say we were…deceived by this so far shades of gray picture we had of him.

Xqc was born into a finically stable middle class family consisting of two cops for parents and a younger sister that came into the world 8 years after him. When he turned 13, and his sister was only 5 at that time, his parents were fired from their job due to a case they shouldn’t have been investigating going wrong, and they had to move to a rural area. Not long after that, he witnessed both his parents’ deaths and saw their corpses with his own eyes, the site was bloody and there’s no way it didn’t traumatize a pre-teen like him. He then was tasked with taking care of his sister, becoming a doctor despite not wanting to, owing others favors and spending all his money on smth that’s yet to be revealed instead of enjoying it. He got married, not to a woman he loves but to someone whom he thought of as “suitable and appropriate”, got cheated on and went through a divorce before losing full interest in the marriage life. He was finally able to retire (we don’t know why yet) and live a quiet, normal, boring life.

I believe xqc loved his parents, I believe he loved them so much cause in chapter 20, he mentions how he thought he wouldnt be able to live past the grief, he wouldn’t be able to go on or move forward, how the grief completely overtook him. He also mentions how he used to play with knots and handcuffs when he was a child, which shows how close he was to them. So for a child who had a good stable life with two loving parents to suddenly fall from a class to a class, suddenly lose both parents and see their corpses with his own eyes, that must’ve fucked him up big time. I’m talking “when can I fully register all of this” kind of fucked up. But he didn’t have time to fully absorb all of this, didnt have the time to sit down and cry, he had a sister, she was only 5, where will they get the money from? What were they gonna do? How was he going to continue school while caring for her? He didn’t have the time to sit down and grief, to sit down and adjust. For a child who had a normal life and didn’t have to worry much about the money like every other middle class kid, he was suddenly burdened with poverty AND loss, and duty and responsibility. Good bye to the days of playing with handcuffs and knots huh?

You ask me, why does xqc not have a favorite food? I answer you, because many many nights, he didn’t know what to feed his sister, much less himself. Cause I bet that many nights, he would have to give up his portion for Xie Xue, to make sure a kid like her is full. Cause he couldn’t afford to be picky, couldn’t afford to choose; whatever was edible will be eaten, taste and flavor be damned. He had to start working from a young age, balance school, babysitting and working all at once. The last friend he made (I think) was that Chen Man guy whose parents were friends with his parents, back when they were alive and life was good. He didn’t have time to make friends, or go out, or have a favorite color or visit the zoo and decide on a favorite animal. No, he had to study, and study hard to become more financially stable and support Xie Xue, he had to raise his baby sister and protect her, he had to work or else how will he put food on their table? Yet he never lost his soft kind heart, cause when his sister asked for a laptop, he bought her one just so that she wouldn’t feel less than any of the other children.

Xqc had to SURVIVE, he had to make do with what he had and what he didn’t have. He didn’t have time to sit down and cry or process his trauma, didn’t even have time to think of adolescent love or his youthful days or do what kids his age did. And all of that carried forward into his adult life. He pushed his emotions back so hard and had his practical, business like mind take care of everything in order to make it through the days. He started to believe that passionate emotions such as love and hate and lust and desire were all a waste of time, a distraction from his duties, smth that will rock the delicate balance he created with his everyday busy schedule. Emotions will stunt you, emotions will delay you, crying and not going to work today means no food to feed his hungry sister with. That’s when he started thinking, strong emotions are a DISEASE, they will take up your time, cloud your judgement, have you make reckless decisions that you’ll regret later. And he couldn’t afford any of that right? Strong emotions are for the weak, they put you in crutches and disable you from moving forward. Wasnt that what he told his ex wife? If he had submitted himself to his grief back then, where would his sister be? Where would he be? How could they have grown up to be healthy and successful adults?

So this man taught himself practicality and duty and priorities. He stopped thinking about himself, about what he wants and what he feels, and instead started making sure that those around him are happy and content and safe and well taken care of. He no longer had desires or passions, he only had rules and regulations. If a person lost their sense of taste, would they still want chocolates and burgers? Would they still have cravings and foods they’d rather swallow medicine than eat? No. If so, how will they decide on what to eat every day? They’ll simply start following a “perfect nutritional plan” and “balanced diet”. They’d eat what they have to eat, when they have to eat, and in the exact portion they need. To them eating would be another chore they have to do every day to keep their bodies going. Similarly, with xqc, graduating, working, marrying, taking care of his sister and auntie, these all became “tasks” and “chores” that he had to abide by and follow. They became the dietary plan for his life till he dies, the outline he shall follow, the textbook rules he will carry out, no need to think of what he “wants” or “desires”, what will make him “happy” or bring him “joy”. He no longer listened to his emotions when making decisions. Even when marrying his ex wife, he married her cause she was “a suitable match”, not for her looks or personality or anything. Feelings are life’s taste buds, and once you remove them, everything becomes tasteless and mundane, and practicality/logic takes over. He stopped knowing what it felt like to choose based on your preferences, cause he stopped having the luxury of choice ever since that night when he was 13, and he no longer was able to re-teach himself the meaning of free will and choice.

So when he yu, in chapter 20, asked him how he would’ve acted if Xie Xue had died, and he said, “I would’ve continued living as I am today till my last breath,” he wasn’t being “cold” or “heartless” or “indifferent” as he yu likes to say. He was being practical and methodical and thinking with a logical approach, rather than an emotional one, just the way he taught himself to throughout all these years. His almost 2 decades of pure survival mode and severely repressed feelings spoke in the form of autopilot. “I would do what I have to do, what I’ve always done every day of my life so far cause what choice do I have?” Is what he meant to say.

But I believe that he’s a soft hearted, kind and loving person. He never says no his sister, never says no to his auntie, helped that homeless man as best as he could, taught he yu that he was normal and that he wasn’t a monster, believed in treating his patients with words instead of medicine prescriptions, believed that the mentally ill deserve to live normally instead of being locked up. I believe that underneath all the shit he has buried, there’s a lot of passion and love that’s been kept dormant for 19 years.

In conclusion, idk where meatbun is gonna take his character but I genuinely hope he gets to heal, and start having more color and flavor in his life. Start allowing himself to live, not just survive.

#case file compendium #xie qingcheng #bing an ben #meatbun doesn’t eat meat #cfc #bab #meatbun

[shijiujun]

i feel kinda bad for shl cos all the fans of hyx and spl are blaming shl since their dramas are being delayed :(

LMAO I really don’t get that altho i can see that the timing might be a little back to back, and i’m not a SHL-only stan by any measure but:

For HYX especially,

Firstly it was already having problems since the end of last year with censorship and review. This is mostly due to the reason that 2ha is a pretty big fandom and is the cult fave in the danmei industry - what this means is that there are three types of fans basically right, (1) Normal fans who love the novel + show (2) Those who fanatically love the novel in some extreme ways haha (3) Those who hate it and/or are HYX-onlys - so you get it all in a bag. 

The first type of fans is definitely the easier ones to deal with, but unfortunately in big fandoms you get a lot of (2) and (3). It’s not something that’s exclusive only to 2ha/HYX but because it’s a cult fave, and a controversial one at that, problems definitely arise.

(2) are the ones who head down to the filming scenes, take photos and footage despite crew telling ppl not to do it, not to sneak around filming sites and definitely not to leak photos or footage. They do it anyway. Yeah sure of course it’s a couple of photos every few weeks or a tiny video every few weeks but word gets out. They’re inevitably hurting the show and the fandom with their actions, because shit trends on Weibo really fast, and the censorship committee (not just for the film industry or shows) is always lurking on the site to catch any sign of you know, hate speech for the country etc. and more. Not related, but the point is that social media is watched very closely. It’s not a myth or an exaggeration, you really just got to be careful, and HYX is a show that, despite not having been broadcasted, has consistently trended on Weibo over the last few months. Not always because of leaks, but yeah, HYX is in everyone’s faces. Fans themselves put a fucking huge spotlight on the show BEFORE we even have any content at all, and of course this isn’t enough to like create huge trouble for the show but then we have-

(3), which I believe creates the most trouble - the thing is 2ha and meatbun who wrote the book, has a long line of haters and antis, way before HYX came into the picture. I shall not go into details of how I’ve seen some big accounts on Tumblr here spit vitriol at the book without even reading it just based on the content/trigger warnings and playing the morality card (and I think most ppl who’ve followed me for a while know just what I think about that). Like this was way before any footage or leaks or even HYX being a thing came about - as a cult fave it has its share of haters, and this share is a huge. There are those who get off on their moral high grounds XD and I think especially these ones are the most troublesome, all they have to do is report that HYX is immoral, bad for culture etc. etc. hahaha and yeah the censorship team is always ready to step in on reports, especially on BL stuff.

And of course the larger part is the change in censorship processes - honestly even way before SHL came out in end Feb, HYX was no closer to getting passed by the review committee than it is now. Maybe yes, SHL scenes may be now used as reference for comparison but seriously? People are deluding themselves if they thought pre-SHL HYX was going through the review process smoothly and only hit roadblocks after. I mean, we’ve all seen the leaks, some of them are truly like god-tier scenes that may be hard to explain away. It’s not like they can repackage the script especially because they have to submit everything to the review committee.

I mentioned this in a post yesterday but how SHL passed reviews is due to the fact that they didn’t have to submit a full script. They only had to submit a partial script, and that makes a world of difference. Basically a team, under these requirements, can repackage the script to include the more het looking parts even I feel, and of course some heavy misdirection by the team, it could work. Now that you have to put an entire script up for scrutiny.. I mean, it’s hard. This is just a game of probability.

And the last reason I think is still Tencent. Honestly, I’ve never seen a huge ass MNC like this handle a show this terribly.

1. No control over leaks - This is honestly the dumbest shit to do

2. Terrible crisis management response time - When fans leak footage, it’s standard and practical business sense to control it IMMEDIATELY. They shouldn’t just leave it up to the crew to put up notices and as the company that owns the rights to the show, it’s up to them to possibly threaten legal action as well. Basically a sterner stance would have helped a lot, but Tencent is a motherfucker of a company who only cares about free marketing and publicity without any considerations over impact to the show itself 

3. Terrible at communicating with fans - Seriously, I’ve never seen a company or team that’s been this bad at confirming delays etc. and providing updates about a show. I understand that it’s mostly due to them not wanting to affect the review process or create more chaos within the fandom but lmao Tencent allowed the hype to build so much and then goes absolutely silent at crazy rumours. I mean we had to find out about a delay from Cai Bao, their cat mascot, like??? In a really veiled and poetic message that didn’t outright say the word ‘delay’ like damn these ppl have a lot of time

As for SPL,

Lol we don’t know anything about this show. We don’t know if they took out or left in the Yifu part that would supposedly make it less gay or whatever, we don’t know anything about how gay it should have been or could have, so this one might be a tad more ridiculous. I mean none of us have seen any good leaks, and we haven’t seen any of the script, we got ZERO idea about this. Maybe they really went hard on the bromance, how would any of us know hahaha so all the more it’s like people have zero basis to go on, to say that it’s because of SHL. Seriously, everyone’s shooting in the dark.

Technically if laws didn’t change last Feb, I think SPL/WIK should have been passed in the same way as SHL did, but it’s just inopportune time for them.

===

- So tl:dr HYX already had tons of problems, that I doubt were going to go away just because SHL didn’t air, honestly. For SPL, it’s really hard to tell what failed the review, because none of us know what’s going on in the script.

No one cared about SHL, even I only realized the show was airing on the day itself and then made a rec post after I watched the first 4 eps. And if it truly was anything to do with SHL, I’m telling you that the first thing the censorship committee will do is basically shut SHL down, get Youku to take it off sites etc. until it’s reviewed again etc. etc. That hasn’t happened yet, at least not before HYX and SPL were stalled.

===

ALSO!! Don’t have to feel sorry for SHl fans hahaha I’m telling ya a lot of us definitely weren’t OG SHL or TYK fans, seriously! All the bigger accounts I see on Twitter are a combination of CQL/SHL or MXTX/SHL, SPL/SHL and I am personally 2HA/HYX/SHL. The fight is all out on Twitter HAHAHAHA but it’s not that bad, we’ve all got practice. Seriously WHO ACTUALLY is an SHL only stan I’ve honestly not seen much?! HAHAHA the point is we’re all yelling on behalf of SHL as a cross fandom fan, easier for us to do so as well. We’re talking about 2ha/HYX/SPL/Priest dedicated accounts that delved deep into SHL championing for no-nonsense in the space hahaha

#asks #shl #hyx #spl #and while i've never worked for the chinese film industry #i was in film and production #so i half know what i'm talking about #and i did ask a friend who works in a chinese film company #and yep ;/ #if you need to know how disastrous big companies are #tencent is a prime example

[u-are-my-melody]

Chapter 206

Oh lord, where do I start.

The doctor is actually crazier than the patient. No wonder He Yu got worse. Did they bond over their mutual obsession of XQC?? Or maybe, in his twisted mind, Anthony actually somewhat believes he has a relationship with He Yu, and in fact, does not? And how the hell did he obtain He Yu's memories? Through the therapy sessions?

I can't tell if Anthony values HY at all, or just his position in XQC's life. Not sure if Anthony wants He Yu for him.

Also, the pokemon toy! Anthony fucking stole it when he was messing with XQC's meds!! That's why, when He Yu went to look around in XQC"s house, he did not find it! I thought it was strange that he only noticed the medicine on the table! If He Yu had found the toy, he would have known XQC cared 😭

Xie Qing Cheng really owned Anthony, but paid a steep price. My God. Will he even survive? His poor brain. That was brutal. Anthony absolutely would have killed him, if he wasn't interrupted. If CM did not show up, would He Yu have come in time? Police's arrival also changed the way HY reacted to the whole thing. If HY was the one who came first to Anthony bashing XQC, he probably would have killed the doctor . But what happened now, it was a disaster. HY only showed care for his face in front of the police, CM, the organisation. Trying to protect his position. And kept trying to 1up CM by bragging about sex ?? That's so sad and it HURTS. This is not the time, He Yu!! All he can see is that CM came to take away his XQC and ignores the fact that XQC's skull was cracked open with most likely very serious consequences 🤧 To be fair, it probably took HY's everything to control himself. The way his movements were so slow.

I think XQC is just going to finish his work restoring the notes and go into a coma. Then He Yu will snap out of it, maybe talk to some people, realize XQC had feelings for him, cry, then begin his quest to save XQC. And suffer all the pain in the world until he brings him back and finds a way to restore his health. Lucky us, we get to suffer with him. Meatbun, the queen of 🔪🔪🔪

Btw, I think Chen Man x Anthony ship has sunk before it could leave the harbor and sail. I don't think it can recover from damage, there is no fucking way CM will forgive Anthony😅

I'm really interested to know if those who hated Chen Man more than Anthony still feel the same 😄

#case file compendium #bing an ben #xie qingcheng #he yu #meatbun doesn't eat meat

[xiaoguiheyu]

83.

He Yu thinks xie qingcheng is wrapped in too much secrets. No matter what he discovers her still finds more layers of secrets.

"You, come with me." Whenever He Yu talks like this to xie qingcheng, it's always funny to me.

Oh he dragged him to an empty classroom. Now he feels like ripping Xie Qingcheng police uniform and kissing him. Gosh he is always like this, Xie Qingcheng exists and he is like I want a to have him so bad. Ah Yu zi, you sure you not love with him?

His intelligent brain crashing due to complex emotions he has for xie qingcheng. Lmao

Even a gaze from xie qingcheng makes him unsettled and restless. The power xie qingcheng has over him is insane.

Ugh this book will be the death of me

Scold him, love him, open him, dissect him. I'm dead. The intensity of He Yu's emotions here. He wants to confront xie qingcheng but he is overwhelmed by his feelings for him. At this point if he doesn't realise his love for xie qingcheng, I'm afraid he yu doesn't know what love means. *the bit about smelling xie Qingcheng's scent* boy is always horny around xie qingcheng.

He bit into xie Qingcheng’s neck while pressing him against a podium. This scene is so hot *hyperventilating*. Xie Qingcheng's blood seems to be the only cure to his bloodlust. I'm sure Meatbun was like this close to making bab an abo or a vampire novel lol. Marking and biting xie qingcheng is something he is really into.

He Yu be really like satisfied with xie qingcheng's unexpected growl and then continue to drink his blood. Ah This dragon finds his human sacrifice too complex so he just drinks his blood instead. I was never into blood play unless it involved vampire characters but hexie has gotten me into it.

He kissed Xie Qingcheng to shut him up. This is hot and funny at the same time.

Ahhhhhhh I'm weak.

Fuck he ended up drinking his blood. This happened for the first time too. So xie qingcheng has never directly consumed he Yu's blood this is the first time.

He yu was really gonna do it in the classroom.

Oh xie ge got him good but that doesn't do anything to He yu at all he likes the violence.

Curse a little more. Hahahhahahhahahahhahahhahahhahahahhah

Oh wow. Xie Qingcheng is in no mood for mercy he's really beating up real good.

My jaw is on the floor rn.

He's seriously lost it.

All mine now. *whimpers at his possessiveness*

Xie qingcheng is affected by blood Gu but this is the first.There are so many things here the entire last part of the chapter. I love everything here just everything. All I can say is I'm absolutely obsessed with this chapter. We are getting so close to the truth and the possibility of Xie Qingcheng also being mentally ill had never occurred to me.

Okay hexie baby is Canon. They have son. *I've ascended.* thank you meatbun I owe you my life for this mini theatre. And also xie xue is actually an alpha.

Also he was forcibly marked by He Yu. The way he always bites him without consent, that's the only way he yu would have marked xie qingcheng for sure.

He Yu is shocked but also curious about xie qingcheng's conditions. Xie Qingcheng really has too many secrets. And we never really get many deep looks inside xie qingcheng's head other then his thoughts on He yu, his frustration about not being able to find out about his parents and his guilt when he wanted to help he yu after the radio tower we barely had any proper look into his head. Meatbun doesn't let us know much about him.

#case file compendium #xie qingcheng #he yu #bing an ben #hexie #hexie brainrot