She scums on my villian til i

hope swells luo binghe's heart as shen qingqiu's hand finds the top of his head. it bubbles away in abject confusion as the hand lifts.

"seriously, you haven't even had your last growth spurt yet. look at your hair, it still has curls — you're still a baby. why would you come back so soon? certainly the cultivation sects are dens of iniquity that deserve to be burned for their crimes, but surely binghe knows he must be undefeatable if he wants to survive enacting such a sweeping change? i've been anticipating this moment since i first met luo binghe, but i'm not so impatient to be tortured to death that you had to be this much of an overachiever! honestly, binghe, go home to your palace and finish your training, what's lighting such a fire under your pants?"

so like i think he's a bit in a trance or something?

i also want to encorporate something about it being "in the book" which the audience takes to mean that sqq had a detailed written plan to raise lbh to bring down all the sects with him. someone (yqy due to experience?) points out that suicidal people are the most cheerful when they have a plan for the act, and hasn't sqq been the most cheerful these last few years, until the obvious?

#oooooough i love that shit where everyone thinks they've figured out SQQ's deal #where they get some/half of it right even if they don't have the specifics

yes, Yes, YES!!! look i love bingqiu with an undying passion, but with the right misunderstandings, with representatives for so many sects here and the issue basically resolved? we could easily have like. another 8 novels of everyone being the smartest person in the room and having COMPLETELY different ideas of what's going on and how to stop it. i love it so much. romance pls burn slower i am sowing political unrest that will last decades.

[good snip comes up again later] #"act on most deeply suppressed thoughts" so like lowered inhibitions combined with compulsion? #possibly with some kind of disorientation and sedative as well #something like that would be some kind of "interrogate enemies on their greatest weaknesses" kind of potion #or perhaps some kind of bullshit animal venom to keep prey docile but still fresh?

vague on purpose, i changed the desc. like 3 times already to describe what i was writing and still didn't fit in "sqq physically trying to straighten and then re-curl lbh's hair" and "it was in the book" so like clearly i vibe with what you're vibing here. i definitely want it to be an almost trance like state, but with full bodily autonomy. like if the description could be valid for interrogation purpose but actually have the result of just his id taking over that would be ideal

Also? in my mind he got it early somehow. lbh impatience and/or going against the plan bc the answers he wants and the farce trial are two separate lines of interrogation? gyz trying to be helpful, heard this potion was for sqq, tells him it's medicinal, he takes it bc without a cure flare up because it "can't hurt"? maybe he takes the whole bottle instead of a dose, rpg health potion style. or fuck, maybe the sowers have it either as a thing to get their infection to spread more naturally or as something zzl gave them to try and lure sqq away. natural adverse reaction between without a cure and the sower infection?

in any case: sqq starts talking before hhp can get any accusations out and this line of thinking seems wayyyy more incriminating so opm gonna let it play out.

"i threw myself at shizun every day when we lived together and this disciple is still a virgin, also if i even suspected any of my shixiongjie of making it where i couldn't, i simply would have killed them in a fit of jealousy"

I'm trying to decide which would be funnier. SQQ latching on to LBH saying he's a virgin and going on a tangent abt all the weird kinky sex he should have had by now. (LBH is living the dream of shizun imagining binghe in sexual situations. Cannot understand how shizun thinks he would be satisfied with anyone but shizun.) (everyone else is just scandalized and learning new things about themselves. jin lan city is abt to have an erotica renaissance). Reinforces "SQQ is a pervert" allegations.

OR option 2: SQQ's brain hears "my precious white lotus disciple propositioned me" and goes on a whole "no no that can't be right. i would have noticed that. that would never happen of course." only for binghe to detail every attempt at seducing his shizun since he was 15.

going from subtle (for a teenager) to outright obscene but SQQ refutes each one with SOME kind of explanation that it seems like he whole-heartedly believes. Gossip will now range from "SQQ is as pure in thought as a young child" to "SQQ is perhaps cursed to be incapable of thinking about sex". Also that such a pure man raised such a deviant disciple. Increases SQQ's reputation, but also makes him appear naive and gullible. LBH reputation goes waaaaaaaaaaaay down.

let it be revealed that he set lbh up as a ticking time bomb with the full intention of changing his face and his name and living a quiet life in the borderlands, that'll cause some angst all around.

SQQ: It's okay I won't die for real! I mean I will die for real, and it will hurt much more this time I presume-

(Several people are now Very Concerned.)

SQQ: but I have back up plan you see! I shall simply move my soul to a new body and pretend I was never Shen Qingqiu who had a terrible life and death. This is what contingency plans are for-

And then he starts lecturing on how "Planning in the past prevents panicking in the present" and how he could have really used that at the last Immortal alliance conference. He knew everything was going to go tits up of course, but he just couldn't bring himself to think about it long enough to plan for it. And of course then he panicked when it mattered most-

and now we can add "SQQ knew about immortal alliance conference and did fuck all" to his list of crimes. And also give LBH new conclusions to make. "Shizun didn't hate him! shizun panicked! :D Shizun's panic response was like. attempted murder! We can work on that though!"

qiu haitang in the background like "oh wow none of you saw this coming, huh? fascinatinggggg"

QHT: wow this whole thing smacks of "carefully planned long term suicide with intent to catch as many bystanders as possible and actually just an elaborate and extreme version of faking one's death to avoid justice for despicable crimes". which this guy has already done to me.

i do love taking the route that just Adds New Crimes tho. "wow, that's way worse than anything i was setting you up for accusing you of, tell us more!" and he does bc infodumping about PIDW is his happy place.

"Of course, none of that happened because of SQH's interventions, so instead Mobei-jun showed up and hurt a lot less disciples than a stampede of Black Moon Python Rhinoceroses would have" maybe accidentally elevates sqh's rep to sainthood? he would hate that more than anything else, i love it 🤣🤣🤣

shizun's panic response was like. attempted murder! We can work on that though!

this line is A+ tier frfr 🤣🤣🤣 perfect binghe in solutions mode, love it, no notes

and yeah while things are coming out i think his blind spots should become increasingly obvious to the point that they have to think he's either under some intense curse or he's been hiding memory loss. and you know, he's currently in a mood to tell you which lmaooo

#since i have been peer reviewed i shall put my words in the post proper and u dont have to extract me from tags

this AFTER leaving the best bit in that tags, we are truly 2 of a kind haha

meanwhile YQY is abt to commit a political incident So Big that it's going to affect the local trout population. like HELL he is going to let OPM get away with slandering his xiao jiu who has been drugged and publicly interrogated when he's unable to defend himself. i dont know what hes going to do but im tired of him being nice. i want him to go apeshit. the tension and drama of CQMS vs HH and whoever else. HH's whole platoon and their angry mob VS YQY

(MQF is like a fly compared to YQY. LBH and LQG are stressed tf out. trying to figure out where a snake that big could have possibly disappeared to) YQY just barely manages to bully huan huan into shutting up but now like. SQQ's rep is in shreds. very "he's either dead now or he's working with demons so you better hope u never see him alive or ur whole sects rep is ruined"

eventually LQG and LBH returning to the CQMS party where they rally up more resources to go hunt down SQQ. cue YQY/LBH 'who loves SQQ more' pissing contest

anyway ALL this buildup to switch over to ZZL spitting out SQQ who is immediately trying to guess what species of snake ZZL should be based off of and oh you guys are heavenly demons? that's soooooo crazy he thought his binghe was the last one. any relation? have you met his binghe?

LBH should break into TLJ's base just to see SQQ with xinxania white boards or w/e lecturing ZZL (taking notes, receiving headpats) and TLJ who has turned to make direct eye contact with the smuggest Most Punchable Aura. (After he got info abt the state of the cultivation sects he's been tricking SQQ into telling the most embarrassing stories about LBH) everyone else follows in and LBH has gone full demon to kick his dad's ass while SQQ is giving a play by play to ZZL as if ZZL doesn't have eyes and isn't watching as well

i am so proud of us scummies we have done so well. The abortion shrine will not claim this baby.

so shen yuan is teaching his son luo binghe how to drive when he instructs him to pull over next to this unfortunate dressed in an ill fitting pencil costume, which would normally 1000% be something dad would avoid. dad has binghe throw on his hazards and then gets into the strangest argument with pencil man, whispering like lbh isn't right!!! there!!! (think shawn and gus from psych, my prototypical 'mostly amicable exes' template)

sy: what have you gotten yourself into this time, airplane?

sy: they've been good to you

lbh: they know nothing about me and they don't even try, they just show up and eat our food once a year and then go no contact again

sy: hey, they showed up, that's more than they ever did for me

lbh: ... so who was planning your birthday parties then?

sy: we should leave if we don't wanna be late

lbh: dad?!

sy: did binghe want to try driving? it's a little more dangerous at night, but that's also why you specifically have to practice

lbh, trying to rip his grandparents a new one: i'm not done lemme at em

[outside, door shut]

✈️: look, lil bro: those aren't just your shitty grandparents, those are your dad's employers

lbh: but—

✈️: not only that, but they're also his backup plan if shit hits the wall to keep you from being homeless

lbh: ....but that's the bare minimum

✈️: that's how your dad raised you. look at him, look at them, do you really think they all have the same values?

lbh: but they treat him like shit

✈️: from their perspective, he spent years talking shit about them, ruining their precious ~public image~, and then the second things got hard he came back begging for help. yes, they're gonna give him shit about it. he knew that when he signed up for it, but he puts up for it for you, because you're his priority. don't make it worse for him than it has to be.

lbh: 😢

Commission for @tk-duveraun ! Based on @cherrichou fanfic "Courting Disaster" !

The first time had been a request from Shang Qinghua - Shen Qingqiu's presence included- and the demon lords had donned human disguises and accompanied them with no idea what they were getting themselves into.

Their human husbands had been perfectly composed and polite during the whole performance. The real show didn't start until they stopped to get some drinks after the showing.

"Alright you joyless curmudgeon, what did you think?" Shang Qinghua said.

Whereupon Shen Qingqiu unleashed an avalanche of expletive laced criticism directed at every aspect of the production before concluding. "It was fine I guess."

Then before either Demon Lord could recover Shen Qingqiu asked Shang Qinghua his thoughts.

Shang Qinghua's opinions are more forgiving but he does explain what he would have written- which is some of the raunchiest material either Demon has ever heard.

Shen Qingqiu then starts picking apart this hypothetical smutty version of the play and the pair of them keep going like that for hours.

It is the most entertaining thing Luo Binghe and Mobei Jun have ever seen. They both just sit in silence and watch their husbands' normal demeanors disappear as the two snipe at each other the whole night.

Unless.... okay, what if Qiong Ding is where all the people who are politically important but not very fit to be cultivators end up? So like, other cultivators know that Qiong Ding cultivators are kinda mid but for regular people & nobles its like ahhh you're from the first ranked peak in one of the top sects you must be super amazing awesome cool!

Ku Xing would have a combination of strongly defined lines not to cross and absolute flabbergastion with the kind of problems normal people face that would be very true to life

Zui Xian could do it in a very "Good Men Don't Need Rules" kind of way

SY!SQQ has no idea that this is his job bc. look at the original goods. look at him!!! THIS GUY was in charge of handling personnel issues aka interpersonal conflicts? nuh uh. no way. but also he's a good hearted, empathetic young man who vaguely knows what business appropriate behavior looks like from his father and probably older brothers, so actually once people are brave enough to bring him their problems he's kind of great at it? like he actually cares about both people coming out feeling understood and taken care of, so better than most HR departments I've heard of. so he thinks he's blowing off his "real work" to go play house but actually he's doing important work!!!

and when it's not really a one-on-one conflict to resolve, he'll send a short note to YQY a description of the situation and the policy he thinks that could change it, and YQY enacts it at the next peak lord meeting no questions asked. like SY's not sure if it's because he thinks the original goods is still going to blackmail him if he doesn't do everything he says, or if it's because it's an actual good idea, but it is a good idea so he shouldn't be too concerned about the reasons why (he'll have been here for 40 years before he figures it out lmao)

SJ!SQQ is of course every bad HR horror story you've heard about. it's his defeatist "there's no point in defending yourself" attitude, and his blatant favoritism. his palm is the easiest to grease in the sect after OG!SQH's, but barring his leaning being weighed in one direction or another, his attitude is very much "this is a martial sect, you should be able to defend yourself" even when it comes to his own kids re: bai zhan raids. (also. like a conversation with LQG is ever gonna end in something other than bloodshed. come on.)

i do think he has a hair trigger when it comes to sexism and inappropriate sexual behavior, but ironically it throws fuel on the lechery fire bc this man can never win. he's not even trying to do anything, he's just always gonna take the woman's side on instinct bc its gotten him farther in life than believing men.

also? honor your fucking verbal contracts. SQQ is a scary bitch but there have to be some like. hall masters on the 10th peak or whatever who have never spoken to him before and are like "he can't be that bad" about it. whether its a bet or a trade or something, he's gonna be like "oh so your word is meaningless? good to know our great sect is in such trustworthy hands" and make the loser do whatever he promised while crying a river.

i do think SQQ is a master of delegation tho so eventually some people just start going straight to MF instead of His Royal Bitchiness. and MF? is a messy bitch who loves drama. he is getting All the receipts, he is reading Everyone for filth, and he is making sure the whole Mountain knows exactly how the situation was handled, as an "example for the future"

but for my money willowwispflame had the most canon take:

he comes back to see jiu-ge very randomly. sometimes it'll only be a week or two before he gets homesick and flies back. sometimes he's so engrossed in a project, he doesn't remember to visit for a year.

(jiu-ge is very insistent that shen yuan lives his own life far away from cqm. despite missing his didi, he knows that if he stays for too long, shen yuan will like it. he will begin to form attachments because thats how he is. and yue qingyuan will smell blood in the water, will take the opportunity to never let shen yuan go - just as shen jiu was trapped by an offer too good to refuse, forever tied to yue qi's side. he refuses to let shen yuan share his fate.)

(add onto that the fact that shen jiu has many enemies who would love to exploit the fact he has a darling younger brother. yeah, he's keeping shen yuan's existence hidden and each visit is a risk.)

imagine his surprise when he visits one year and his brother says "yeah, i've taken the position of peak lord. my new title is shen qingqiu."

cue "oh fuck my brother is the scum villain"

he starts visiting a lot more, trying to change the plot to save his gege's skin. but he can't visit too much or it gets suspicious. he tries to admonish his behaviour, but his brother has always been stubborn, and refuses to listen. the day binghe gets selected, shen yuan is hiding and holding his breath. when shen jiu pours the scalding tea over his head, shen yuan wants to throw up.

they have a big fight over his treatment of binghe. shen jiu just can't understand. shen yuan thinks that what hes done is horrible, and he's too emotional to argue well, to make shen jiu see his point. they go to sleep in separate rooms.

shen yuan sneaks out of the room and looks for binghe.

while he is sleeping, shen yuan tends to his wounds and leaves medicine and a container of hot food with a heating talisman.

after the abyss, shen yuan dresses up as his brother and apologizes to binghe for all he's done in the past. his acting is superb. every facial expression, every intonation of his voice - shen yuan has practiced tirelessly. he knows binghe is not easy to fool. but nobody knows shen jiu has a brother, and he had to at least try and save his brother's skin, and if binghe is unsatisfied then at least the one who gets maimed will be him and not jiu-ge.

meanwhile, luo binghe stares at the man with the most sincere eyes he's ever seen. when shen yuan says sorry, indeed, he is sorry. the guilt is clear.

and yet.

this person is not his shizun.

luo binghe thinks back to the times he caught "shizun" leaving warm food at the woodshed. to the late nights he had caught "shizun" wandering around the peak, where "shizun" would look at him, actually look at him - not just pass his eyes over him like he was trash on the street.

to the night where he had woken up, and "shizun" was there, applying salve to the wounds he himself inflicted.

he thinks,