OG Mobei-Jun ruled his kingdom with an iron fist. After getting betrayed by Shang Qinghua, he made sure to manage his lands all on his own with no help. He was extremely skilled and smart, and no one but the Emperor himself could take him down
He enters the world the Emperor was recently kicked out of, and he sees this version of himself lounging on his throne eating demonic grapes. He doesn't know basic math or the names of half of his allies, while Shang Qinghua runs around doing all his work. He is pathetic and lazy and OG Mobei-Jun is extremely jealous
During corpse shizun time luo binghe goes and intends to mess with lqg In his Dreams because uhmmm reason exept he gets stuck In lqgs dead wife sqq montage dream.
‘He could finally do what Yue Chenging had always yearned he would: look down with a soft smile, raise a softly glowing hand, and gently place it atop Yue Chenging's head.’
lore is: SJ became a real demonic cultivator (not the piss poor stuff Wu Yanzi tried to teach him). He's known to be an arsonist—with stabby stab tendencies—targeting vile people the kind of Qiu Jianluo. So he's mostly left alone by “righteous” cultivators until he attacks a man too close to the emperor's ties. And YQY and Co are tasked to find him and kill him.
YQY recognises him after giving a deadly blow. If SJ survives—and YQY bc he's not living life having killed Xiao Jiu—is up to you 👈
I dont think lbh ever really tried to kill lqg during the 5 years of corpse-zun...but i think it would be hilarious if, because liu qingge is an anomoly who was never meant to fight lbh, who admittedly isnt on binghe's level but hes still pidw's war god.....
Lbh just is incapable of killing lqg. Like some sort of video game glitch, like when you take an item out of its designated area when youre not supposed to and the game cant quite do what you want to, everytime binghe tries to kill lqg some sort of looney tunes-shit happens that save lqg last minute. Like the worlds game engine can let them fight, and Lqg will never be able to beat lbh in a fight, but everytime lbh tries to actually kill the man, he starts falling into xianxia manholes and xianxia anvils start falling a la the beam falling during the skinner incident
The Brothel Situation in svsss and slavery in a historical fantasy context
(Pls mind the tags!)
Since most sj-centric stories touch on his brothel visits I'd like to chip in a bit about my own read on the situation as a chinese reader. The wider context is that for a significant part of chinese history, the operation of brothels was very much legal and somewhat regulated. There were instances of high class courtesans achieving great acclaim as poets, artists, musicians and the like, since their lives tended to revolve around entertaining powerful literati patrons and were expected to provide not only companionship but intellectual stimulation (see my previous post on the literati). This is not to say that they were genuinely respected by society as a whole, since they were still 1) women 2) brothel workers (even those who didn't engage in physical sex work), but depending on the sociopolitical climate of any given time period, the concept of visiting brothels was generally not frowned upon.
The main issue of people (specifically lqg) giving og!sqq grief about frequenting brothels has to do with the fact that in svsss/pidw's setting, cultivators, at least cangqiong cultivators, have a bit of an ascetic reputation. Qingjing peak goes particularly hard on the ascetic vibes; the name Qing-Jing itself means "pure and tranquil", and you often see this word used in buddhist texts. It's brought up frequently that they eat bland food, play bland music, live in quaint little houses despite being loaded etc., and a Qingjing head disciple is obviously expected to uphold these values. Still, this does not necessarily mean that people have a problem with sex work as a concept, in the grand scheme of things. We know that og sqq still becomes peak lord despite this particular misdeed. His behavior is considered extremely cringe and antithesis to his lofty immortal persona but not sinful in the western sense of the word, since despite having an ascetic reputation qingjing disciples aren't actual monks, unlike that other actual ascetic peak I can't remember the name of. (This is also sqq's own defense when yqy confronts him about his brothel brawl with lqg.)
Like most popular fiction, svsss has a pretty hand-wavy approach when it comes to these matters, though this is more apparent in its portrayal of slavery. The actual historical practice of slavery was a byzantine mess of a system that's impossible to summarize in a post like this, and historical fantasy generally aren't interested in examining or untangling said mess. Still I think it's worthwhile to note that the chinese understanding of slavery is distinct from the more western concept of chattel slavery that's heavily influenced by recent american history. Among the broad concept of "slaves" there are different conditions that can't be easily classified via common english terms. Some are hereditary, some are more like indentured servitude. Laws and customs also varied across regions and time periods.
Svsss's take on slavery is far more simplified. We know that the Qiu brother was somehow able to legally emancipate sj on a whim and even betroth him to his sister, which would be ludicrous in a more grounded historical setting. Cangqiong also seems to take all comers with no regard to their legal status, though it's unclear whether this is a given feature of the pidw world or if Cangqiong is just particularly enlightened. (Yqy would have otherwise been instantly exposed as a runaway when asked to produce his papers, and I don't think lbh would have had any identity papers either.)
(Here's another reminder to mind the tags.)
Regardless, the concept of slavery in svsss still exists as a general approximation of historical slavery. There's this sort of fanon idea of sj desperately hiding his old slave brand, which is not really a thing in this historical context. Afaik a domestic slave (家奴) like sj would be denoted by his dress and some sort of paperwork, and branding would be considered some weird torture method. I wouldn't put it past qjl to resort to such methods just for the lols but it wouldn't be considered a typical mark of "regular" slavery, and it would in fact expose qjl as an unhinged psycho. What would not expose qjl as a psycho, ironically and tragically enough, is the implication that he also sexually abused sj. Legally speaking, within the broader context of this kind of setting, you can't really sa your own slave. As in, it would not be considered criminal. Whether it would be considered immoral or even mildly distasteful was largely up to the individual and the social climate of their time. If you read older pre-censorship works you might constantly run into the word 娈童 (luantong, literal translation "lovely boy"), which was a very old and widespread practice of engaging in sexual activities with teenage male slaves and/or sex workers. It's often translated as "catamite", though it really has little in common with the greek definition of the word. In some historical situations it was even considered less problematic than sleeping with female slaves, because in theory at least, it was generally expected that any female slave a master had physical relations with had to be made a concubine, but there were no such complications with male slaves.
I bring this up partly to highlight how powerless sj was in that situation, despite some very basic rights afforded to domestic slaves like not being punished unjustly or executed without trial. (Though in practice this is largely unenforceable anyway.) Even if we put aside the matter of pride, he really had zero recourse and its no wonder he went berserk. And even if a young qiu haitang were to find out the truth the most she could do was freak out. Either way, sj would still be trapped. The pride factor also plays a big part, i think. This is well beyond the scope of this post, but suffice to say that topping and bottoming were viewed very differently in traditional chinese culture. The modern concept of homosexuality was not a thing, and while sex between males was often a non-issue, being in the receptive role could be seen as degrading or disgraceful. We sort of see this bleed into modern attitudes towards sex, with sy being weird about the idea of letting lbh bottom. (Not his perfect manly protagonist!) All this is to say that given og sqq's character, I do see him as the kind of guy who would rather die than be seen that way, even if he had no choice.
So, would sj's tragic backstory help his case at all in the eyes of his peers and the larger cultivation world? I honestly can't tell you. While the world of svsss features a much less rigid social hierarchy, as well as a lot of world building details meant to appeal to modern sensibilities, it still comes with the trappings of the kind of historical realities that have shaped chinese historical fantasy as a genre. It's unavoidable that a lot of this is lost in translation, but I think it's still interesting to consider the original context of the story.
If you've made it this far, my compliments again for getting through another long rambling post (now with extra problematic content!) I do want to emphasize that regardless of what I say, i think its important that western fan creators just tell the stories they want to tell and not be overly bogged down by cultural context or "historical accuracy". These posts are made for sole purpose of sharing my thoughts and maybe being an interesting read.
Imagine some lower middle court heavenly official minding their own business and this crazy half-feral dude ascends, blood dripping from the empty gouged-out socket on his face and down the eye of the sword he presses to their throat because they had the misfortune of being closest to where he spawned in. His aura is all wrong somehow, different, making the hair on the back of their neck stand up. He grabs them by the collar and he presses that bloody blade against their throat and he snarls at them, "Where is the Crown Prince of Xianle?" "Not here," they manage. "Banished." And before they can say another word this newborn god simply yeets himself right back out of heaven and leaves them spending a solid couple centuries going "????? the hell did Prince Xie Lian do to piss that guy off?"
nothing makes me go "ooooh we are NOT the same" quite like reading some post about how people talk with their parents about their interests. what do you mean you told your father about stevebucky. what do you mean he asked further questions
"i sent this article to my relative" "mom & i were discussing dialectical materialism" you navigate the world with such a different set of parameters than i
Shen twins Liujiu AU where whenever Shen Jiu wants to be nice or help Liu Qingge he just pretends to be Shen Yuan.
Liu Qingge is just really confused because Shen Yuan seems different and he really likes him and it seems like he likes him to but then he'll see him again and he acts just like friends and somehow different and he doesn't know how he feels.
Shen Yuan is just despairing like please...please stop this and just communicate please.
Shen Jiu: I don;t what your talking about and I hate that brute
Shen Yuan:You are such a tsundere
Shen Jiu: I still have no idea what that word means.
My brain keeps rotating on the concept of a Liujiu AU where at some point between their rivalry as head disciples and becoming peak lords, Liujiu get together.
However, their behavior doesn't change whatsoever. They still scream at each other during peak lord meetings, still get in random fights, still diss the fuck out of each other. They're just also dating. (Bc any ship with SJ is just automatically toxic yaoi sorry thems the rules)
They quite enjoy the dynamic. It's enrichment for them. Shen Jiu gets to take out his rage on someone consequence free, and Liu Qingge gets all the fights he could ask for, plus they both get less awkward aphrodisiac relief.
They both think they're quite obvious about it, but not a single other person has picked up on it. Except maybe Luo Binghe.
Yue Qingyuan keeps trying to get SQQ to stop aggravating LQG and SQQ is Horrified and Disgusted that YQY keeps trying to, what, interfere in his sex life? Kink shame him? What is this??
He, of course, responds with fan beatings and incoherent screeching rather than anything that would clue YQY in.
Everything goes great for LiuJiu, until, that is, the Lingxi caves.
Where Shen Qingqiu still fails to save Liu Qingge.
Naturally, SQQ is miserable, despondent, and rages at anyone who dares to even reference Liu Qingge. The rest of the peak lords think he's being defensive because he killed LQG, and especially Liu Mingyan and Qi Qingqi.
However, SQQ is not willing to let LQG go so easily. Using demonic cultivation he learned in his past with Wu Yanzi, he seals LQGs soul in one of his fans, effectively forcing his dead boyfriend to haunt him, and goes into a research deep dive to try and figure out how to bring LQG back, the ghost of said man bopping around beside him, supremely annoyed at his new incorporeality.
This culminates in him finding a way, while his martial siblings are rallied to prosecute and imprison him for the murder of LQG despite YQYs protests.
This results in SQQ committing corpse theft, Luo Binghe style, and also kidnapping said Luo Binghe after figuring out about his heavenly demon blood, and going on a cross country road trip with an unwilling disciple, a pissed off ghost, and a corpse trying to find various PIDW plot devices to fuel his LQG-Resurrecting demonic cultivation, while the rest of the peak lords hunt him down looney toons style, trying to get the corpse back and capture SQQ.
It, of course, culminates with a dramatic evil looking ritual done by SQQ, being attacked by 9 peak lords.
However, when the ritual finishes, instead of LQG rising as some kind of evil mind controlled killing machine controlled by SQQ, it's just Liu Qingge.
