This post seems to be taking over my day dreaming brain.
Can't quite decide if I might write something with it, or if it will stay as a fun little brain scenario. Either way, I'm flinging thoughts about it at Tumblr (mainly because I'm at work and if I don't write it down I will definitely forget).
So! MXTX but make it ants!
...ant based?...ant adjacent?
Anywho, still figuring out ABO aspects but! I have this -
Each Sect could function like a separate colony. The Sect Leadership would be the Queens (not sure which would be Alphas or Omegas).
Each Sect already has different abilities/techniques due to having different origins (Jiang - hunters, Lan - monks, Nie - butchers, etc), but what if they were based off of different ant species? Or elements of different species mushed together?
If we follow the thought that Alpha pheromones could be curtailed by spritzing with water, then the Yunmeng Jiang would be screwed, being a water based Sect. HOWEVER, there's an ant species that dives!
Diving ants, colobopsis schmitzi, dive into pitcher plants to pull out prey. Yunmeng Jiang could have techniques that allow them to dive without being affected by the water. (This, of course, would not help during the day if someone just spritzed an Alpha, they have to prepare to dive, you can't prepare about a Jianghu appropriate squirt bottle you don't know is coming).
The Wen could be more fire ant based.
The Jin could have elements of honeypot ants, with their gathering of gold (could also say their talent is becoming bloated with their own self-importance).
There's actually a meat ant that's like a butcher ant, so that could cover the Nie.
Not sure on the Lan yet, maybe they're more generic ant but based of communication via vibrations and such.
I can't decide who would be what between Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji.
Omega!LWJ has its appeal - annoying Alpha!WWX having water flicked at him to suppress his pheromones, briefly causing him to feel like he's died, so Lan Wangji can escape. Maybe it's against the Rules, but there's nothing to say Wangji can't knock a dew covered tree to coat a pursuing Wuxian in water droplets.
Omega!WWX has its appeal in crafting ways to bypass Alpha pheromones. Talisman that creates little rain clouds above Alphas heads. Little charm with an array to gather ambient water to release in a burst at Alphas. Instead of punching Jin Zixuan, he absolutely drenched him with a talisman that creates water that's resistant to drying talismans. JZX thinks he's dead for hours.
And fierce corpses! What if they're due to zombie ant fungus! Or at least a form of it. The dark veins associated with it could be what shows the spread of the fungus. Corpse dust would be the spores. What if Wen Ning was infected with the fungus, but they managed to cure him? The effects could still be there - the blackened veins, pheromone death, etc - but he would actually be alive and relatively well. Or it'd possibly be more like surviving with the effects of a chronic illness - can't be fully cured but can be managed.











