Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you plann'd:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
- Christina Rossetti, Remember Me (excerpt)
I felt like drawing Elf Lan Wangji again, in his forest of frost and decay and despair. I’ve drawn him only once before, but in my head I’ve already spent quite some time with him, and the other people in the Mirkwood AU. I miss him.
Also I haven’t talked to @bilboo in a while, and I feel kinda bad about it; so this is to make up for it. ♥
Bilbo Baggins never fully recovered from his time spent meeting with Thranduil.
The ring not only delayed his aging, but the greying of his hair also.
Bilbo could not allow this, as he too was now in competition with Thranduil, and his L’Oréal locks of enviable lust.
However, Bilbo had one thing the Elven King did not. Curls.
So early into his return back to Bag End, Bilbo promptly bought hair lightener on the black market in Bree.
Bilbo’s silver locks, of which we see sixty years later in Rivendell, are in fact not due to aging (not at first at least), but rather are due to an insane jealousy of Thranduil’s hair - leading to many nights of forcing a young Frodo to apply bleach, and toner to his naturally red curls.
-XOXO Gossip Girl (I have very reliable sources coming straight from Middle Earth with all the inside scoops of drama)
7. Is there anything you used to like but can’t stand now?
hmm... i guess, in the very beginning of getting into mdzs, i kinda liked wangxian, but now i wish there was less wangxian and more lxc content. is it to the point where i “can’t stand” wangxian? not really, haha. but that was the only thing i could think of for this question.
10. Most disliked arc? Why?
answered here!
26. Most shippable character?
lan xichen.
... i mean, c’mon — y’all knew he was going to be my answer 😂 but, for real... nielan, xicheng, xiyao, xisang, songchen/xilan/lanlan (whatever people call the song lan / lan xichen ship), and, of course, xiliu (lan xichen / wen zhuliu). no one can love better than our beautiful zewu-jun.
“[[MOR] this is very ‘mortifying ordeal etc’ BUT that would come up...”
I literally can't wait to write this bc in my head jc's disciples and servants LOVE HIM, he is grumpy ALWAYS but he's also endlessly fair and doesn't suffer bullshit, everybody is treated so well at lotus pier I LOVE ONE ANGRY SOUR MAN
YESSSS EVERYTHING PRECIOUS ON EARTH FOR THE GRAPEBOY
and now i’m thinking about, for example, some important conference everyone has to attend (even though it’s basically glorified small talk, and everyone DREADS it aside from sect leader yao, who is finally allowed to talk, and not stop talking, and he has five days) so at some point the disciples gather and exchange juicy gossip talk respectfully about their sect leaders, and
“surely you jiangs have it tough, i mean no offense, but sect leader jiang looks like he’s permanently on a verge of a meltdown--”
“--right, i’ve noticed that too, and the way he’s constantly clenching his teeth? he must be very good at cracking nuts, and i admire that, but at the same time, i can’t help but worry--”
“--and okay, you can punish me for that (in fact look, i am punishing myself as we speak), but i mean, his life can’t be that stressing now, all the serious stuff is long since over, so... i mean, you know... kind of makes you think that all this tension...”
“...aah--”
“--is because he doesn’t have... you know”
and the jiang disciples are just sitting here like :-) because on one hand, their first instinct is to vehemently deny everything, how dare you;
the second is to give the others a knowing look, lean forward and spill some of the secrets in a stage whisper, let those other disciples wander around for the rest of the conference, take one look at the scary sect leader jiang and experience internal anguish knowing this ruthless man is in fact in possession of three spiritual dogs and one dog dog, named apricot, pear, hunter and persimmon, you’re free to guess which is which, and he takes great pleasure in flipping their ears, then telling them “your ears are flipped, you know?”. yes, there is proof, but you’ll have to ask a-mei in private, sect leader has forbade her from ever talking about it to anyone, and if he hears her laughing like that, he will know;
the third is to keep silent, because really, where does one start?
there was one little girl, a-ming, who was so bad at archery it seemed almost like a conscious effort (even though of course it wasn’t, she was too young for that). most of her arrows missed the target completely, usually landing in the grass, other disciples’ targets or, on one memorable occasion, almost in sect leader jiang’s own person, because he just had to be taking a walk right next to that disaster of a lesson. a-ming burst into tears before sect leader even managed to drop the hand he caught the arrow with; tears so miserable and dramatic that something must have cracked in him, because a second later he was next to her, talking so quietly you couldn’t hear what he was saying, but, if one can allow themselves to theorize, probably trying to prove a-ming that he is, in fact, still in one piece, so there’s no reason to cry like that, now. and then, once she more or less calmed down, he positioned her little hands himself, checked if she was aiming at her own target (she was not), assured her that it’s obligatory to be bad in the beginning, how else does she expect to become good, and then, in what must have been a flash of godly wisdom, asked her, “do you see that point in the center of the target?”, to which a-ming replied with the saddest silence imaginable, and every single adult present suddenly felt very, very stupid
for obvious reasons the jiang sect has many young disciples, also those helping w/ pretty responsible things, like Finances and Trade and all this stuff i’m scared of, and many of those disciples have shared stories of fucking up, thinking “oh, that’s it. i’m going to die OR i’m getting kicked out of the sect into next thursday OR both” and getting scolded but also... somewhat encouraged? they’re not sure in what way, exactly, since everything sect leader jiang said sounded angry, but... one man who missed a line in a list of things to be shipped out has been told “no, you’re not leaving this sect unless sudden death takes you, and in that case i’ll be dragging your ghost to work here, do you think it’s so easy to find a good accountant?” and realized a week later that, in fact, yes, the good accountant was him
literally everyone and their dog has heard a threat of physical violence of sorts, including but not limited to (insert bone) breaking, dismemberment, flogging (regular or a few round with zidian to help you find the motivation to (crowley voice) DO BETTER!!!), drowning, etc, etc but no one has ever received it, mysteriously
several times, when young-but-old-enough-to-know-better disciples have Spoken when it wasn’t really their turn/position/the TIME to say anything, sect leader jiang raised his head and said, slowly and quietly, what the fuck did you say to me? most of them, pale as a sheet, said that nothing, nothing and drowned in their own apologies. one girl, though, repeated what she said, assuming that well, if she fucks up, she fucks up with style. sect leader jiang looked at her, looked at the Papers, looked at her again, and said “you’re right. thank you”
she was later found stress-sobbing
she was, much later, awarded a Position
maybe it is not exactly a proof of sect leader jiang being a good person per se, but there are rumors of the faces he pulls and things he mutters when reading Important Sect Correspondence, and it all makes everyone have warm thoughts
on the other hand, the insinuation that sect leader jiang is a bitch because of sexual tension and no one to resolve it with is the funniest thing they’ve ever heard, so there.
[RISES FROM THE DEPTHS] did someone say I could use my extremely specific equestrian knowledge for the untamed because HERE I AM to talk to you about those horse gifs, you're absolutely right, The Bouncing should be harmonious and controlled, and not.... That :D
I did not think I would see words “specific equestrian knowledge” today, but boy am I grateful because that’s been BOTHERING ME like
I don't even know what timelines ARE anymore but late or not, happy birthday!!! you have been one of the most inspirational people in this fandom and I admire your writing greatly! have a lovely day <3
Ahhhhhhh!!! Thank you so much!! (I'm sure it's still 5 Nov somewhere in the world, so you're not late!)