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alias_sqbrGuide and links
Content Notes for the book in general: consent issues, sexualisation of children, gore, mixed treatment of cross-dressing, suicide, child harm, incest subtext, emotional abuse, ANGST
These are all fairly short and easy to follow, here's the link if you want to just read them yourself. Chapters 245 is fluff spiced with angst, the rest have stuff some people may find triggery.
After the extras reactions I have some further thoughts on the book as a whole. I went back over my reactions posts to fix up the really glaring errors and gaps, which made me realise a few things I'd missed.
Alsoskygiants wrote a very amusing and much more succinct post about the book that also gave me some food for thought.
Spoilers ahead!
Chapter 245: Lantern Riddles, YuanXiao Night
In the first half, Xie Lian spends one of his first Lantern Festivals alone as a scrap collector, suffering awkwardness at a food stall when he can't afford to pay. In the second half, Xie Lian and Hua Cheng have a romantic Lantern Festival date in Ghost City. There's some cute Chinese word puzzles which the translator is nice enough to explain.
Chapters 246-249: The Crown Prince's Bizarre Memory Loss Adventures
TIME FOR AGE-REGRESSION SHOTA FANSERVICE IN THE OTHER DIRECTION.
Xie Lian loses his memory and thinks he's 17 again, shortly before his ascension. It's pretty cool seeing all the little and big ways his personality has changed, and sweet seeing him fall in love with Hua Cheng in a kinda new way, while also having vague memories of his existing love.
But also. I was already impressed with MXTX's ability to squeak sexy dubcon under the radar but this is...well. Now I understand why all the sexy HOB fic tends to have certain similarities: Xie Lian keeps having intense sex flashbacks that are just disjointed and vague enough to get past the censors but still VERY CLEAR in the details (which are very....Chinese BL. I still think it sucks MXTX was stopped from writing the weird bitey sex her heart clearly desires, even if I'm using the vagueness as an excuse to ignore any implied sex canon I don't like)
On the one hand, this is kinda hot! And while Hua Cheng clearly finds the young Xie Lian intensely attractive, and is aware that Xie Lian is just as attracted to him, he doesn't take advantage per se (though he does get Xie Lian to call him gege/older brother, and is very into it)
On the other hand, the poor kid thinks he must have been raped, and Hua Cheng doesn't explain that he wasn't. Also he clearly enjoys and encourages Xie Lian's confused attraction. Now deep down Xie Lian knows these are consensual sex flashbacks but just doesn't want to admit it, and I am willing to forgive a certain amount for porn logic (or "as close to porn as she can legally write" logic) But it still felt a bit gross. Once he gets his memory back Xie Lian does in fact accuse Hua Cheng of having been skeezy, to which he skeezily replies that Xie Lian is welcome to scold him.
Also Xie Lian, Feng Xin and Mu Qing all look the way Xie Lian expects them to, implying...they all look 17??? Hua Cheng apparently looks 20, though that may just be the age he chose when trying to look sexy-but-reliable to 17 year old Xie Lian. THE SKEEZE. Though obviously he also just enjoys reliving their first meeting as the cool successful grownup he wanted to be instead of the weak dirty child he actually was.
It's canon that Xie Lian has indeed lost his magical celibacy powers, it seems like Hua Cheng just gives him magic when he needs it (EDIT, based on later stories: with sex). But I imagine he can regain them if he starts a new cultivation path, it'll just take a while.
Note: it starts with a trigger warning for sexual harassment, because at one point Xie Lian encounters a woman being threatened with rape. He rescues her and beats up the creeps.
Chapter 250: The Demon King's Bedtime Story- Reading Material for Children
Haha omg this is very silly but a lot of fun. Hua Cheng gets Ghost Flu so Xie Lian reads him a story he happened to pick up while collecting trash (which he still does?) that turns out to be about them...kinda. It's basically a Bluebeard style fairytale with Hua Cheng as the Mysterious Ghost Husband With Secret Rooms That Can Only Be Unlocked...with body fluids. 'Lady Windmaster' suggests the solution: a whole lot of sex.
Xie Lian: THIS ISN'T APPROPRIATE FOR CHILDREN AT ALL WHO WROTE THIS
Hua Cheng: Read me another :D
Xie Lian: No!
Hua Cheng: *cough* But I'm so sick ;_;
Xie Lian: ...fine. Once there was a young crown prince cultivating alone on a mountain top, when he met a mysterious guest...
Chapter 251: Aiyah! Cave of Ten Thousand Gods
Oh dear. So, immediately after sex (THIS IS PLOT RELEVANT), Xie Lian tells Hua Cheng he wants to visit the cave of ten thousand Xie Lian statues again. Hua Cheng is honoured but then sneaks off to the cave alone first, so Xie Lian follows. But because sex fills Xie Lian with so much magical energy he inadvertently brings the statues to life. Luckily these stone Xie Lians are mostly polite and helpful, if in some cases sad, but then Xie Lian sees the one Hua Cheng snuck off to hide: SEX POLLENED TEEN XIE LIAN.
Why did you carve that Hua Cheng you absolute weirdo.
And it turns out Hua Cheng's solution is...to create a Hua Cheng statue to have sex with the sex pollened Xie Lian statue?? (Did he know they'd come to life??)
Xie Lian: Surely this method is too, um...
Hua Cheng, kneeling: Your highness, I was disrespectful. Please believe me, I never had any blasphemous intent or disrespect towards the statue of your highness. If your highness feels this method is inappropriate, I'll find another.
They have SUCH a weird dynamic
Xie Lian realises that Hua Cheng worries Xie Lian will think he's a gross offensive perv.
Xie Lian: Of course I believe you. You've always been very respectful of me.
Xie Lian can't bring himself to say that Hua Cheng isn't blasphemous, though. Sometimes he blasphemes with his god multiple times a day.
Still too embarrassed to say what he's agreeing to, Xie Lian gives the Hua Cheng statue life and it starts looking around as if trying to find someone...because the sex pollened Xie Lian has escaped!
Soon they hear horrified reports from Feng Xin and Mu Qing of a weird half naked Xie Lian statue running through their palaces. Because that's always who a young Xie Lian turns to for help. And then the statue gets frustrated trying to stab it's rock body with a sword :(
But it all ends happily in the two statues having sex in Mu Qing's garden before their sparks run out and they're forever frozen in each other's arms (Mu Qing does not consider this a happy ending)
Xie Lian and Hua Cheng take the statues back to the cave, and agree that the other Xie Lians seemed lonely in their way too. So Hua Cheng begins the task of sculpting a matching Hua Cheng statue for each, starting with a little spitfire Hua Cheng child for the young Xie Lian wanting someone to admire his swordwork, and eventually even making a Hua Cheng for the depressed Xie Lian drinking alone. And each of them will only have eyes for their matching other half.
Chapter 252: The Ghost King's Birthday
I actually read this one first. It's enjoyable fluff about Xie Lian asking lots of people for help to decide on a present for Hua Cheng's birthday.
He gets the ghosts to organise a surprise party, cleaning up the city. I'm always charmed by how much they love Hua Cheng, even if their gift ideas are, like, love potions and fertility spells.
Shi Qing Xuan cheerfully suggests a bunch of expensive things they would have liked to have owned back in the day, and Xie Lian has to be like "Um...from your description, Hua Cheng already owns that and uses it as a footstool >.>"
Guoshi suggests he ask Jun Wu, who is being suppressed by Mount Tonglu deep underground, but WEIRDLY ENOUGH Xie Lian decides not to.
Xie Lian makes Hua Cheng a Longevity Lock pendant made of silver. It's very pretty, and full of spiritual power.
But then Xie Lian starts feeling unbearable agony in his heart every time he looks at or thinks about Hua Cheng. Hua Cheng leaves, to keep him safe, but Xie Lian can't stop thinking about him, and chases after him, saying "I'm used to bearing pain. I can bear the pain if you're beside me. But I can't bear it if you leave."
It's Lan Qian Qiu who figures it out, when he senses that someone has been messing with the grave of the Guoshi of YongAn.
It turns out Xie Lian made the pendant from the silver mask he wore as Guoshi of YongAn, since he had been fond if it, and had magical properties. To get to it, he'd dug into his own grave. He was in that coffin for years, nailed in place, starving and bleeding and in constant pain in the dark.
All that blood returned to his body when he melted the mask, and caused him pain whenever his blood moved too quickly...which happens every time he thinks of Hua Cheng.
Hua Cheng crumbles the pendant to dust, and the pain stops.
Xie Lian apologises for ruining his birthday, but Hua Cheng says knowing that Xie Lian wants to be with him so much makes him intensely happy, even though he never wants Xie Lian to suffer such pain ever again.
THE END
Aww.
So, some final extra thoughts:
Xie Lian wore a mask as the Guoshi of YongAn, I missed the significance of that the first time.
It was pretty clear from the start that 'young' Lang Ying is hundreds of years old. Oops.
Jun Wu is the one who caused the sex pollen. I mean that's not a twist, I just hadn't put it together before. And since most tortures he puts Xie Lian through replicate experiences he had...did Jun Wu experience or do some weird sex thing? D:
Also I guess the sexy mural Feng Xin and Mu Qing saw was probably about the sex pollen. Which was a genuinely formative spiritual moment for Hua Cheng. In a...permanent psychosexual obsession with his god kinda way.
It really bugged me not being able to remember how Hua Cheng got the other pearl earring, so I poked around and afaict he stole it the first time he met Xie Lian, as a child.
Every time I skimmed over early scenes to fill in blanks I hit little things I'd missed which resonated with the broader story. Like the young Lan Qian Qiu observing Xie Lian using a technique which relies on massive self sacrifice, and Xie Lian saying that's not something he needs to learn.
I think this book would very much reward rereading. Especially since I couldn't remember which was which of Mu Qing and Feng Xin for most of the first two books >.> Also I paid almost no attention to what weapons people used which meant, for example, that the symbolism of the black sword went over my head for a looong time. Also Hua Cheng and Mu Qing are both commoners of Xie Lian and both use sabers.
I was SO SURE Hua Cheng's missing eye was something he'd been born with and had PLOT SIGNIFICANCE but nope.
skygiants says "The romance in this one is fascinating because on Xie Lan's side it's a pleasant low-key friends-to-lovers, while on Hua Cheng's side it is passionate religious fervor of 800 years' standing; the weird and intense line between worship and love is not a direct line to my id but I feel fairly sure it is a direct line to someone's" and (a) that's a very cute way to put it and (b) It's not a direct line to my id but it's certainly...something.
Also I agree with her that the book brings up a bunch of complex questions about power and godhood etc but in the end focusses on a fairly straightforward "kill the evil father figure, gain success, find romantic happiness" ending and isn't very interested in fixing the system or even questioning it much any more.
*ponders how I could approach this in fic without being massively offensive and/or having to do more research than I can be bothered doing*
But for now: that is really, truly, the end!
Content Notes for the book in general: consent issues, sexualisation of children, gore, mixed treatment of cross-dressing, suicide, child harm, incest subtext, emotional abuse, ANGST
These are all fairly short and easy to follow, here's the link if you want to just read them yourself. Chapters 245 is fluff spiced with angst, the rest have stuff some people may find triggery.
After the extras reactions I have some further thoughts on the book as a whole. I went back over my reactions posts to fix up the really glaring errors and gaps, which made me realise a few things I'd missed.
Also
skygiants wrote a very amusing and much more succinct post about the book that also gave me some food for thought.Spoilers ahead!
Chapter 245: Lantern Riddles, YuanXiao Night
In the first half, Xie Lian spends one of his first Lantern Festivals alone as a scrap collector, suffering awkwardness at a food stall when he can't afford to pay. In the second half, Xie Lian and Hua Cheng have a romantic Lantern Festival date in Ghost City. There's some cute Chinese word puzzles which the translator is nice enough to explain.
Chapters 246-249: The Crown Prince's Bizarre Memory Loss Adventures
TIME FOR AGE-REGRESSION SHOTA FANSERVICE IN THE OTHER DIRECTION.
Xie Lian loses his memory and thinks he's 17 again, shortly before his ascension. It's pretty cool seeing all the little and big ways his personality has changed, and sweet seeing him fall in love with Hua Cheng in a kinda new way, while also having vague memories of his existing love.
But also. I was already impressed with MXTX's ability to squeak sexy dubcon under the radar but this is...well. Now I understand why all the sexy HOB fic tends to have certain similarities: Xie Lian keeps having intense sex flashbacks that are just disjointed and vague enough to get past the censors but still VERY CLEAR in the details (which are very....Chinese BL. I still think it sucks MXTX was stopped from writing the weird bitey sex her heart clearly desires, even if I'm using the vagueness as an excuse to ignore any implied sex canon I don't like)
On the one hand, this is kinda hot! And while Hua Cheng clearly finds the young Xie Lian intensely attractive, and is aware that Xie Lian is just as attracted to him, he doesn't take advantage per se (though he does get Xie Lian to call him gege/older brother, and is very into it)
On the other hand, the poor kid thinks he must have been raped, and Hua Cheng doesn't explain that he wasn't. Also he clearly enjoys and encourages Xie Lian's confused attraction. Now deep down Xie Lian knows these are consensual sex flashbacks but just doesn't want to admit it, and I am willing to forgive a certain amount for porn logic (or "as close to porn as she can legally write" logic) But it still felt a bit gross. Once he gets his memory back Xie Lian does in fact accuse Hua Cheng of having been skeezy, to which he skeezily replies that Xie Lian is welcome to scold him.
Also Xie Lian, Feng Xin and Mu Qing all look the way Xie Lian expects them to, implying...they all look 17??? Hua Cheng apparently looks 20, though that may just be the age he chose when trying to look sexy-but-reliable to 17 year old Xie Lian. THE SKEEZE. Though obviously he also just enjoys reliving their first meeting as the cool successful grownup he wanted to be instead of the weak dirty child he actually was.
It's canon that Xie Lian has indeed lost his magical celibacy powers, it seems like Hua Cheng just gives him magic when he needs it (EDIT, based on later stories: with sex). But I imagine he can regain them if he starts a new cultivation path, it'll just take a while.
Note: it starts with a trigger warning for sexual harassment, because at one point Xie Lian encounters a woman being threatened with rape. He rescues her and beats up the creeps.
Chapter 250: The Demon King's Bedtime Story- Reading Material for Children
Haha omg this is very silly but a lot of fun. Hua Cheng gets Ghost Flu so Xie Lian reads him a story he happened to pick up while collecting trash (which he still does?) that turns out to be about them...kinda. It's basically a Bluebeard style fairytale with Hua Cheng as the Mysterious Ghost Husband With Secret Rooms That Can Only Be Unlocked...with body fluids. 'Lady Windmaster' suggests the solution: a whole lot of sex.
Xie Lian: THIS ISN'T APPROPRIATE FOR CHILDREN AT ALL WHO WROTE THIS
Hua Cheng: Read me another :D
Xie Lian: No!
Hua Cheng: *cough* But I'm so sick ;_;
Xie Lian: ...fine. Once there was a young crown prince cultivating alone on a mountain top, when he met a mysterious guest...
Chapter 251: Aiyah! Cave of Ten Thousand Gods
Oh dear. So, immediately after sex (THIS IS PLOT RELEVANT), Xie Lian tells Hua Cheng he wants to visit the cave of ten thousand Xie Lian statues again. Hua Cheng is honoured but then sneaks off to the cave alone first, so Xie Lian follows. But because sex fills Xie Lian with so much magical energy he inadvertently brings the statues to life. Luckily these stone Xie Lians are mostly polite and helpful, if in some cases sad, but then Xie Lian sees the one Hua Cheng snuck off to hide: SEX POLLENED TEEN XIE LIAN.
Why did you carve that Hua Cheng you absolute weirdo.
And it turns out Hua Cheng's solution is...to create a Hua Cheng statue to have sex with the sex pollened Xie Lian statue?? (Did he know they'd come to life??)
Xie Lian: Surely this method is too, um...
Hua Cheng, kneeling: Your highness, I was disrespectful. Please believe me, I never had any blasphemous intent or disrespect towards the statue of your highness. If your highness feels this method is inappropriate, I'll find another.
They have SUCH a weird dynamic
Xie Lian realises that Hua Cheng worries Xie Lian will think he's a gross offensive perv.
Xie Lian: Of course I believe you. You've always been very respectful of me.
Xie Lian can't bring himself to say that Hua Cheng isn't blasphemous, though. Sometimes he blasphemes with his god multiple times a day.
Still too embarrassed to say what he's agreeing to, Xie Lian gives the Hua Cheng statue life and it starts looking around as if trying to find someone...because the sex pollened Xie Lian has escaped!
Soon they hear horrified reports from Feng Xin and Mu Qing of a weird half naked Xie Lian statue running through their palaces. Because that's always who a young Xie Lian turns to for help. And then the statue gets frustrated trying to stab it's rock body with a sword :(
But it all ends happily in the two statues having sex in Mu Qing's garden before their sparks run out and they're forever frozen in each other's arms (Mu Qing does not consider this a happy ending)
Xie Lian and Hua Cheng take the statues back to the cave, and agree that the other Xie Lians seemed lonely in their way too. So Hua Cheng begins the task of sculpting a matching Hua Cheng statue for each, starting with a little spitfire Hua Cheng child for the young Xie Lian wanting someone to admire his swordwork, and eventually even making a Hua Cheng for the depressed Xie Lian drinking alone. And each of them will only have eyes for their matching other half.
Chapter 252: The Ghost King's Birthday
I actually read this one first. It's enjoyable fluff about Xie Lian asking lots of people for help to decide on a present for Hua Cheng's birthday.
He gets the ghosts to organise a surprise party, cleaning up the city. I'm always charmed by how much they love Hua Cheng, even if their gift ideas are, like, love potions and fertility spells.
Shi Qing Xuan cheerfully suggests a bunch of expensive things they would have liked to have owned back in the day, and Xie Lian has to be like "Um...from your description, Hua Cheng already owns that and uses it as a footstool >.>"
Guoshi suggests he ask Jun Wu, who is being suppressed by Mount Tonglu deep underground, but WEIRDLY ENOUGH Xie Lian decides not to.
Xie Lian makes Hua Cheng a Longevity Lock pendant made of silver. It's very pretty, and full of spiritual power.
But then Xie Lian starts feeling unbearable agony in his heart every time he looks at or thinks about Hua Cheng. Hua Cheng leaves, to keep him safe, but Xie Lian can't stop thinking about him, and chases after him, saying "I'm used to bearing pain. I can bear the pain if you're beside me. But I can't bear it if you leave."
It's Lan Qian Qiu who figures it out, when he senses that someone has been messing with the grave of the Guoshi of YongAn.
It turns out Xie Lian made the pendant from the silver mask he wore as Guoshi of YongAn, since he had been fond if it, and had magical properties. To get to it, he'd dug into his own grave. He was in that coffin for years, nailed in place, starving and bleeding and in constant pain in the dark.
All that blood returned to his body when he melted the mask, and caused him pain whenever his blood moved too quickly...which happens every time he thinks of Hua Cheng.
Hua Cheng crumbles the pendant to dust, and the pain stops.
Xie Lian apologises for ruining his birthday, but Hua Cheng says knowing that Xie Lian wants to be with him so much makes him intensely happy, even though he never wants Xie Lian to suffer such pain ever again.
THE END
Aww.
So, some final extra thoughts:
Xie Lian wore a mask as the Guoshi of YongAn, I missed the significance of that the first time.
It was pretty clear from the start that 'young' Lang Ying is hundreds of years old. Oops.
Jun Wu is the one who caused the sex pollen. I mean that's not a twist, I just hadn't put it together before. And since most tortures he puts Xie Lian through replicate experiences he had...did Jun Wu experience or do some weird sex thing? D:
Also I guess the sexy mural Feng Xin and Mu Qing saw was probably about the sex pollen. Which was a genuinely formative spiritual moment for Hua Cheng. In a...permanent psychosexual obsession with his god kinda way.
It really bugged me not being able to remember how Hua Cheng got the other pearl earring, so I poked around and afaict he stole it the first time he met Xie Lian, as a child.
Every time I skimmed over early scenes to fill in blanks I hit little things I'd missed which resonated with the broader story. Like the young Lan Qian Qiu observing Xie Lian using a technique which relies on massive self sacrifice, and Xie Lian saying that's not something he needs to learn.
I think this book would very much reward rereading. Especially since I couldn't remember which was which of Mu Qing and Feng Xin for most of the first two books >.> Also I paid almost no attention to what weapons people used which meant, for example, that the symbolism of the black sword went over my head for a looong time. Also Hua Cheng and Mu Qing are both commoners of Xie Lian and both use sabers.
I was SO SURE Hua Cheng's missing eye was something he'd been born with and had PLOT SIGNIFICANCE but nope.
skygiants says "The romance in this one is fascinating because on Xie Lan's side it's a pleasant low-key friends-to-lovers, while on Hua Cheng's side it is passionate religious fervor of 800 years' standing; the weird and intense line between worship and love is not a direct line to my id but I feel fairly sure it is a direct line to someone's" and (a) that's a very cute way to put it and (b) It's not a direct line to my id but it's certainly...something.Also I agree with her that the book brings up a bunch of complex questions about power and godhood etc but in the end focusses on a fairly straightforward "kill the evil father figure, gain success, find romantic happiness" ending and isn't very interested in fixing the system or even questioning it much any more.
*ponders how I could approach this in fic without being massively offensive and/or having to do more research than I can be bothered doing*
But for now: that is really, truly, the end!
final thanks
Date: 2022-04-22 01:37 pm (UTC)rizzle
Re: final thanks
Date: 2022-04-22 01:46 pm (UTC)Ah, I'm so glad! It was lovely getting comments on these old posts and knowing random people are still stopping by and enjoying them :) You inspired me to put the guide up on the AO3, since that's a more obvious place for people looking for this sort of thing.
Another random visitor
Date: 2023-11-22 02:22 pm (UTC)Re: Another random visitor
Date: 2023-12-05 08:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-11-24 06:31 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-12-05 07:51 am (UTC)Thank you! It's great to know people are still enjoying them!