storytelling to the void

@somefishycat @zyrafowe-sny @whimsicalmeerkat annnnnd now we have a totally random assessment of words! AKA ill-advised au where I've given two characters kids (they should not be having kids together) (they're fine for now)

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Jiang Mingxi didn’t really like children. This was less a statement about children and more a statement about people. In general, she didn’t really know what to do with them. Children, despite their size and ignorance about the workings of life, were still people; Jiang Mingxi and people did not get along.

She hadn’t thought about how this would apply to her own children, but in retrospect, the answer had been obvious. There had been no instant connection to the child, no maternal instinct telling her what she was supposed to do. Faced with the prospect of holding a baby – any baby -- Jiang Mingxi was left only with the conviction that she was somehow unqualified for it.

The baby didn’t soothe her feelings about this. The baby only stared at her with big, dark eyes, as if it, too, was judging her.

@whimsicalmeerkat i'm going to work my way through this eventually...

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Quickly, all these cultivators fell nearly into line behind a young woman, who saluted them with blood-slick hands. “Apologies for interrupting your hunt,” she said, “but it seemed you needed assistance.”

They needed assistance like a knife in the back.  Shen Jiu resisted the impulse to curl his mouth into a sneer.  The woman wasn’t watching him, but that high-handed young master certainly was, glaring disapprovingly at Shen Jiu like some shit on the ground his servants had failed to clean up.

Shen Jiu wanted to stab his eyes out.

“I don’t really know what you want from me,” Chen Lihua said. “Do you want me to tell you I hate it? Do you want to hear that I know that I could be better than this? That I’m the best actor in the entire crew, and the only reason why I haven’t crushed them all is because the universe hates me?”

Yang Haoran blinked. “Um.”

Chen Lihua shrugged. “Well, there you go,” she said, and continued delicately breaking off pieces of the chocolate bar he’d been holding. “This is actually really good. Is this rich people chocolate? Am I eating more than my entire day’s wage?”

“It’s rich people chocolate,” Yang Haoran said. Jiang Mingxi had gotten him a basket at some point, and Jiang Mingxi spent ridiculous amounts of money on everything without blinking. “Is it really okay like this?”

“That’s up to you,” Chen Lihua said. “If I finish up your chocolate bar, are you going to be mad?”

“Not that.”

Chen Lihua smiled, a little wry. “Is anything going to change if I’m not okay with it?”

@auburnlaughter @zyrafowe-sny @whimsicalmeerkat @twyrewolf thank you! what i happen to need to work on most is everything is fine, so -- here's me hammering away at it.

“I hope it’s to your liking, my king,” Shang Qinghua says, as if he doesn’t have a drawer in his office dedicated to Mobei-jun’s drink preferences. Shang Qinghua remembers. He has always had good memory for things like this.  A good eye for anyone and everyone’s likes and dislikes, spoken and unspoken.  Always eager to know how to please, and excellent at figuring out the answers even when nobody wants to tell him.

“Did you need anything from me today, my king?  This humble one is happy to oblige.”

@zyrafowe-sny @sourb0i @kalira @whimsicalmeerkat we are doing our best with deadlines!!!

and now, from the grand wip file:

"Hello, Liu-shidi," Shang Qinghua said.

"Shang Qinghua," Liu Qingge said, and then he said, "What the hell."

Goddamn it, Liu-shidi.

Shang Qinghua knew it was a surprise, but couldn't he have come up with something better to say than that? Maybe he should've sent a note ahead, after all. Then Liu-shidi could make himself look appropriately touched at Shang Qinghua's offering.

@whimsicalmeerkat yo!!!!

Chen Lihua could be described in any number of ways, but most of them, at the moment, invoked those pure-and-innocent types you normally saw in cliche novels. You know, heart-wrenchingly beautiful with crystal tears welling up in her bright eyes, looking wronged as she was screamed at by some girl that Yang Haoran didn’t even bother trying to recognize. There were flower petals streaming down in the background, which was impressive, because they were currently indoors.

One stream of flower petals hit Yang Haoran in the face.

@whimsicalmeerkat here you are!!!

"Why?" Yue Qingyuan said.

Shang Qinghua raised an eyebrow. "It's only polite to offer Zhangmen-shixiong a drink, isn't it? This master could add poison, if it would make you more comfortable." With that, he retrieved a small bottle from his sleeves, setting it down delicately on the table.

This wasn't the answer Yue Qingyuan wanted. In all fairness, he hadn't asked the right question.

"Why did you betray Cang Qiong?" Yue Qingyuan said.

@whimsicalmeerkat youuuuu got it!

Yang Haoran and Jiang Mingxi had never seriously discussed children, but over the course of their lives, it had been clear that 1) there was going to be at least one child 2) Yang Haoran was going to name it, because Jiang Mingxi knew she was bad at names.

Accordingly, Yang Haoran had come up with a list. Over the years, he'd picked out his number one, which he personally thought sounded nice and expressed good intentions for the child's future.

Except there was never going to be a child, now, was there?

"Maybe I'll call you Li'an," Yang Haoran told the cat, smoothing his hand between its ears. "It's not like I'll get to use that name for what I wanted to, anyway."

The cat blinked at him uncomprehendingly. This was the only response he received.

Yang Haoran wasn't sure what he was expecting. Of course the cat wouldn't care about this. The cat didn't care about his problems. What did cats know? The cat only really cared that Yang Haoran was willing to feed it leftover fish.

haha. hi there.

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"I can't believe," Yang Haoshu said tenderly, "that perfect Jiang Mingxi is such a fucking idiot."

There was something to be said, about the effect of a diametric contrast between tone and word choice. Did you listen to the tone or did you listen the words? It would sound a little wrong either way, wouldn't it? There was insincerity in either direction.

Jiang Mingxi blinked rapidly. Oh, wouldn't it be nice if she could trust Yang Haoshu's tone? How sweet! How pleasant! But picking one or the other was all about context, and their context was ten years of Yang Haoshu picking at anything and everything she could get to make Jiang Mingxi start a fight she couldn't win.

"He's lying," Qiu Haitang said furiously. "There's nothing wrong with A-Ling!"

Actually, Luo Ling rather thought there were a lot of things wrong with Luo Ling. Still, Qiu Haitang was right: the cultivator was almost definitely lying. Degrading prosperity, bad luck? Sure, why not. But you could look at any other slave at Qiu Manor and say the same thing. None of them had much prosperity or luck to begin with; if they had, they wouldn't be slaves in the first place.

That cultivator had sounded properly righteous when talking to Qiu Jianluo, but Luo Ling still remembered what he looked like when he'd first caught sight of Luo Ling at the marketplace.

He'd looked hungry.

happy 4 month anniversary to this ask

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Another explosion.  Again, the target is a vase, and not Yoo Joonghyuk’s head. Thank you, +20 Dexterity stat.

“Is – is this supposed to b-be doing something?”

Well, damage would be nice – but it’s not about damage.  It’s about throwing another target.  It’s about getting close enough to the assassin that it doesn’t matter that the only thing Yoo Joonghyuk has in his hands is another fucking vase.  Less energy on evasion, more energy on something that will actually end the fight.